**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US AT
rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
Ray's List will be offline on Tuesday - We'll be poll workers!
Be sure to vote!
Ray and Michael
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
Maryland Appeals Court Rules in Co-Parent Case
Leonard Link (blog), November 5, 2006
http://newyorklawschool.typepad.com/leonardlink/2006/11/maryland_appeal.html
Maryland Appeals Court Rules in Co-Parent Case Arthur S. Leonard
In a custody and visitation dispute between a lesbian adoptive mother andher former domestic partner, a five-judge panel of the Maryland Court ofSpecial Appeals (an intermediate appellate court) has ruled in Janice M. v.Margaret K., 2006 WL 3114248 (Nov. 3, 2006), that the adoptive parent wouldnormally take priority over the co-parent for an award of custody as amatter of constitutional law, but the co-parent would normally be entitledto visitation if she could establish that she was a "de facto parent" to thesatisfaction of the court. Writing for the unanimous court, Chief JudgeJoseph F. Murphy upheld both the award of visitation and the denial ofcustody by the Baltimore County Circuit Court.
The mothers in this case, Janice M. and Margaret K., had a domesticpartnership relationship from 1987 until 2004. In 2000, Janice M.adopted Maya, a one-year-old child from India. From the time Janice returnedto the States with Maya, she and Margaret acted as equal parents to thechild, sharing all responsibilities and forming parental bonds.
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The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/world/americas/15939853.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Mon, Nov. 06, 2006
CUBA
Cuban gay soap cracks legacy of hate
The huge success of a gay soap opera suggests Cuban society has begunto accept homosexuality.
BY MIAMI HERALD STAFF
cuba@MiamiHerald.com
SANTA CLARA, Cuba - It's a late Sunday afternoon at El Mejunje, Cuba'sonly openly gay disco, and some men are dancing or kissing while Alex isremembering the days he ducked police harassment by faking straightrelationships.
''In 1980, during Mariel, we were thrown out of the country with thecrazy people and criminals -- the useless,'' said the 42-year-old restaurantmanager. ``People threw rocks at us. I was forced to have girlfriends and dothings that were beyond me.
``Things have changed a lot.''
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The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/nationworld/ats-ap_top15nov06,0,3551907.story
Israel Refuses to Ban Gay Pride Parade
By MATTI FRIEDMAN
Associated Press Writer
November 6, 2006, 5:39 AM EST
JERUSALEM -- Israel's attorney general refused to ban a gay pride parade inJerusalem despite threats of violence from ultra-Orthodox Jews, instructingpolice and gay activists to try to work out a compromise, the policecommander said Sunday.
A Justice Ministry statement said Attorney General Meni Mazuz ordered policeto meet with gay activists "to work out a reasonable alternative proposal"for the march, set for Friday on a route through the middle of the city. Themeeting is to take place Monday, gay activists said, and a compromise waslikely.
Ultra-Orthodox Jews have rioted in Jerusalem nearly every night over thepast week, burning garbage cans, blocking roads and assaulting policeofficers in an attempt to get the authorities to call off the march,approved months ago by the Supreme Court. Many religious Jews, Muslims andChristians see homosexuality as a sin and the march as an affront to thesanctity of the holy city.
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The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-haggard-sex-allegations,0,2288426.story
Fired Evangelist Asks for Forgiveness
By COLLEEN SLEVIN
Associated Press Writer
November 6, 2006, 7:29 AM EST
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. -- Members of the New Life Church were stunned andbrought to tears by the Rev. Ted Haggard's confessions of "sexualimmorality," then accepted his plea for forgiveness with open arms.
Haggard, who had been a leading evangelist and vocal opponent of gaymarriage, apologized Sunday in a letter read from the pulpit of the14,000-member church he founded.
Some in the standing-room-only crowd wiped away tears and embraced eachother as they heard Haggard's words read by a member of the board that firedhim a day earlier.
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The Express Gay News
http://www.expressgaynews.com/print.cfm?content_id=3182
International News
Member of British Parliament leaves wife for man: report
Nov. 03, 2006
LONDON - Greg Barker, the shadow environment minister in England'sParliament, is said to have ended his marriage of 14 years with his wife,Celeste, after having a year-long affair with a male interior designer, theDaily Telegraph reported. Barker and his wife have two sons and a daughterbetween ages 6 and 11, according to the report. The paper said Mrs. Barkeronly recently learned of the affair and is "absolutely devastated" about it.
She had dedicated her life to her husband's political career, the papersaid. Barker, who entered the Commons in 2001 and was a member of fellowParliament member David Cameron's successful Tory leadership campaign lastyear, refused to comment in any detail on the reports. In a statement issuedthrough Conservative headquarters, Barker, 40, said: "It was announced inJuly that my wife and I had separated, and we are entitled to a privatelife." When asked to confirm that he had left his wife for a man, Barkersaid, "It's a private matter." The designer is believed to have carried outextensive work on the couple's house in Rye, East Sussex, the DailyTelegraph said.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
Beliefnet.com, November 5, 2006
http://www.beliefnet.com/story/203/story_20331_1.html
The Truths of Ted Haggard's Story
Haggard's story reveals that life and love are much more complicated thanthose opposing gay marriage want us to believe.
By Macky Alston
Here's the day's spin from Colorado Springs: A gay prostitute and drugdealer tempts a pillar of the church. The man of the cloth comes close to afall, but resists at the decisive moment. He remains "steady" with his wifeand five children. The gay guy, Mike Jones, who sounds pretty normal, ispainted as the tempting devil, opportunistic in his timing and depraved inall aspects of his being. Haggard, who sounds like a cornered animal, comesoff as the tempted victor.
Of course the reference is to Christ in the wilderness. A colleague ofHaggard's, the Rev. Donald Armstrong, rector of Grace Episcopal and St.Stephen's Church, is quoted in the Colorado Springs Gazette yesterday assaying,
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The New York Times
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/05/AR2006110500372_pf.html
Abortion Tops Divisive Ballot Measures
By DAVID CRARY
The Associated Press
Sunday, November 5, 2006; 1:42 PM
-- Even if no candidates were running, this Election Day would be dramaticas voters across the country consider ballot measures on a multitude ofhot-button topics _ abortion, gay marriage, affirmative action, illegalimmigration, sex crimes, even legalizing marijuana.
In all, there are 205 measures on the ballots in 37 states _ a total toppedonly twice before. Huge sums have been spent, including tens of millions ofdollars by tobacco companies fighting anti-smoking measures and by oilcompanies fighting a proposed California oil-production tax.
Voters in sparsely populated South Dakota face perhaps the most momentouschoice _ whether to uphold or reject a new state law that would banabortions except when necessary to save a pregnant woman's life. Activistson both sides of the national abortion debate see it as a historic test ofpublic sentiment.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/06/us/06minister.html?ei=5094&en=8425c671c396276f&hp=&ex=1162789200&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print
November 6, 2006
Disgraced Minister's Church Wrestles With His Absence
By KIRK JOHNSON
COLORADO SPRINGS, Nov. 5 - Long before the first tissue boxes were passeddown the aisles for mopping tears, and before the first guitar chords werestruck to begin the worship, many of the thousands of people who gathered onSunday morning at the New Life Church here knew that it would be a serviceunlike any other in their lives.
Some were curious outsiders, drawn by the moment and the sense of history.Even church leaders were not fully sure what to expect.
"We're living this in real time," said Rob Brendle, an associate pastor, ashe bustled through the 14,000-member evangelical church making last-minutepreparations for the 9 a.m. service.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/washington/politics-usa-elections-democrats.html
November 5, 2006
U.S. Democrats Appear on Smooth Campaign Ride
By REUTERS
Filed at 10:33 a.m. ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democrats, who have been known to bungle goldenpolitical opportunities, are holding their breath. With just days to gobefore voters could hand them control of the U.S. Congress, their ride hasbeen relatively smooth.
Instead of shooting themselves in the foot, they have sat back and watchedPresident George W. Bush's Republicans do the self destructing, dragged downby influence-peddling and sex scandals, the Iraq war and a slow responselast year to Hurricane Katrina.
Democrats, by comparison, have sustained few self-inflicted wounds andsuffered only a minor scrape last week with Sen. John Kerry's ``botchedjoke'' about Iraq.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-mideast-gay-parade.html
November 5, 2006
Israel Seeks to Scale Down or Move Gay Pride Parade
By REUTERS
Filed at 5:27 p.m. ET
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel's attorney-general ordered police on Sunday totalk to gay leaders to convince them to make a planned gay pride event inJerusalem more modest, or even move it out of the city, amid fears ofviolent protests.
Shortly after Attorney-General Menachem Mazuz's announcement, hundreds ofultra-Orthodox Jews rioted in the city, setting containers ablaze aspolicemen on horseback rode through the streets to stop them. Several peoplewere detained.
For the past week, ultra-Orthodox Jews have launched similar protestsagainst the parade, scheduled for Friday, in Jerusalem and other religiousJewish communities in Israel.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Haggard-Sex-Allegations.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print
November 5, 2006
Evangelical Pastor Confesses to 'Sexual Immorality'
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 11:46 p.m. ET
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP) -- Saying that he was a ''deceiver and liar''who had given in to his dark side, the Rev. Ted Haggard confessed to sexualimmorality Sunday in a letter read from the pulpit of the megachurch hefounded.
The disgraced former president of the National Association of Evangelicals,which represents 30 million evangelical Christians, apologized and said''because of pride, I began deceiving those I love the most because I didn'twant to hurt or disappoint them.''
''The fact is I am guilty of sexual immorality. And I take responsibilityfor the entire problem. I am a deceiver and a liar. There's a part of mylife that is so repulsive and dark that I have been warring against it forall of my adult life,'' he said.
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Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/200611050405/NEWS08/611050347&template=printart
School play draws protesters, arrest
A man is charged outside Valley High after tackling a 'Laramie' protester.
By JARED STRONG
REGISTER STAFF WRITER
Two demonstrators attacked a group of Kansas protesters who picketed ValleyHigh School's fall play Saturday night.
Andrew James Volker, 26, of West Des Moines was arrested after he tackledone of the 16 members of the Westboro Baptist Church who held signs and sangsongs that denounced homosexuality as they protested from 6 to 7 p.m. nearValley High.
No one was injured.
An unidentified man ran with Volker west across Valley West Drive andallegedly took two of the protesters' signs. Volker was quickly apprehendedby West Des Moines police, but the other man ran back across the road into asea of counterprotesters and could not be located.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://thehill.com/thehill/export/TheHill/Features/CapitalLiving/110106_gaymafia.html
We're no mafia, gay staffers declare
By Emily Heil
As the scandal over former Florida Republican Rep. Mark Foley and hiscome-ons to underage male pages simmered, gay Hill staffers were feeling theheat. Some Republicans circulated the storyline that a "gay mafia" insulatedFoley from reproach, covering up or downplaying his untoward and possiblyillegal behavior.
Weeks later, the scandal has left staffers and others who ostensibly make upthat "mafia" feeling burned. Far from being a shadowy cabal ofhyper-protective operatives, those who consider themselves part of the Hill'sgay community say their social and professional network operates like somany others in a town where who you know trumps everything, and the linebetween work and play is fuzzy at best.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/nathaniel-frank/haggard-foley-and-gop-pr_b_33179.html
Haggard, Foley and GOP Preaching Against the Very Vices They Can't Shake
In the latest sign of rank hypocrisy among social conservatives, thepresident of the 30-million member National Association of Evangelicals hasresigned amidst accusations that he had a relationship with a maleprostitute. Ted Haggard, who is married with five children, is a frequentadviser to the White House, and a staunch advocate of banning marriagerights for gays and lesbians.
The news, of course, comes just a month after Florida GOP Congressman, MarkFoley, who had pushed legislation to protect youth from "exploitation byadults using the internet," was revealed to be an internet sexual predator.And it adds to the sense among weary voters that their leaders, especiallyif they happen to be Republicans, cannot be trusted to do the right thing.
Indeed, the chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committeeacknowledged he had been aware of Foley's inappropriate emails for months,but took no steps to protect the children who were in harm's way. Instead,he spearheaded a series of TV ads attacking a Democratic challenger for,yes, being soft on child molesters.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hbcko2xyrlE&eurl=
Jimmy Swaggart Will Kill a Gay Man [VIDEO]
(Sounds like he doesn't understand the GOD knows everything in the heartsand minds of men. And to say he would "kill a gay man and then tell God hedied" is not only a lie before the Great and Awesome God it is saying thatHe/She doesn't know what you are thinking and doing. HYPOCRITE)
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The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/living/columnists/leonard_pitts/15939871.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
IN MY OPINION
Democrats may win, thanks to GOP stumbles
BY LEONARD PITTS JR.
lpitts@MiamiHerald.com
A letter to the Democrats.
Congratulations. If the prognosticators are correct, you are about to win avictory that will shift the balance of power in one or both houses ofCongress. Of course, if the prognosticators are incorrect, you will soon becommitting hara-kiri. In which case my only advice would be: one hard thrustand then pull up.
But this letter proceeds from the assumption that the prognosticators areright. On that basis, I want to make a plea.
Let me preface by saying the campaign that ends here feels like it's beenseven years long. Last week, The Washington Post published a storydescribing it as ''a carnival of ugly, especially on the GOP side.''The Post was referring to ads like the one in New York that accused aDemocrat of using taxpayer money to pay for phone sex -- after a campaignaide misdialed a government office and reached a porn line, at a total costto taxpayers of $1.25.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest toRays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
Monday, November 06, 2006
NATIONAL & WORLD DIGEST NOVEMBER 6, 2006
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US AT
rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
Ray's List will be offline on Tuesday - We'll be poll workers!
Be sure to vote!
Ray and Michael
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/judicial/scotus-abortion.htm
O'CONNOR FEARS ASSAULT ON COURT'S INDEPENDENCE
Retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor said she fears judges areunder growing political attack nationwide.
"I'm increasingly concerned about the current climate of challenge tojudicial independence," O'Connor told a gathering of state judges fromaround the country Friday. "Unhappiness with judges today is at a veryintense level."
The judiciary is the weakest of the three branches of government, she said,and therefore the one with "the greatest need to be defended."
The executive and legislative branches have become the attackers, so "theprincipal defenders are going to have to be the people of this country,"with lawyers taking the lead, she said.
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The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/nation/15939848.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Mon, Nov. 06, 2006
Change may be afoot in the South
Many political contests in the South, such as the U.S Senate racebetween black Democrat Harold Ford Jr. and Bob Corker, illustrate theregion's changing political face, which could mean a reversal of itsRepublican tide.
BY AUDRA D.S. BURCH
aburch@MiamiHerald.com
NASHVILLE - Standing on the edge of a dusty flatbed, Harold Ford Jr.delivers a speech of promise in a horse stable just outside the city. Here,in a rural patch 38 miles from downtown, Ford, a five-term Congressman, isdistinguished by his European-cut navy suit and cowboy boots, his polishedway, his celebrity appeal.
But the U.S. Senate candidate, a black Democrat who hopes to rewritehistory in a state that twice carried President Bush to the White House, hascharmed the crowd with his centrist talk. He's connected with thispolitically diverse audience who showed up for bowls of chili, country tunesand possibly change.
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The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/nationworld/ats-ap_politics11nov06,0,3952157.story
Parties Work to Turn Out Voters
November 6, 2006, 4:24 AM EST
WASHINGTON -- A day before midterm elections, both parties are focused onturning out voters in the battle for control of Congress.
Republicans and Democrats have sent thousands of volunteers to states withthe most contested races to work phone banks and canvass neighborhoods. Bothparties also have assembled legal teams for possible challengers in case ofvoting problems.
Up for grabs are 435 House seats, 33 Senate seats, governorships in 36states, and thousands of state legislative and local races. In 37 states,voters also will determine the fate of ballot initiatives, including whetherto ban gay marriage, raise the minimum wage, endorse expanded embryonic stemcell research and -- in South Dakota -- impose the country's most stringentabortion restrictions.
Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., hoping to become the first female Housespeaker, stumped for Democratic challengers in the Northeast on Sunday.
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The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/business/local/sfl-ybtech06nov06,0,5680003.column?coll=sfla-business-front
Make sure your wireless network isn't open to everyone
Robyn A. Friedman
Real estate and technology
November 6, 2006
Vasco Bilbao never thought about securing his home wireless network.
He accessed the Internet via a cable from his laptop to a wireless router,and he thought his connection was secure since he wasn't using the network'swireless capability. Then his connection speed slowed to a crawl, and hislaptop settings started changing -- on their own.
"I'd go onto my laptop, and it would be like a different laptop," saidBilbao, who lives in Miami. "Even my icons were changed."
Bilbao got nervous because he did his banking online. So he called in theGeek Squad, a 24-hour computer support service launched in 1994 that becamea subsidiary of Minneapolis-based Best Buy Co. Inc. in 2000.
Bilbao learned that his wireless router created an open network -- a networkthat, without proper security, was being accessed by others. Ray Lopez, theWest Kendall-based Geek Squad agent who responded to Bilbao's call, did somesimple tweaks to the system. In about 30 minutes, he added encryption andchanged the SSID, the "name" of the wireless network that is broadcast toall wireless devices within range.
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Washingtonpost.com
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/05/AR2006110501260_pf.html
In Missouri, a Forecast for Voter Misery
By Amy Goldstein and Peter Slevin
Monday, November 6, 2006; A06
Move over, Florida. You, too, Ohio. The state most ripe for voting disputesin tomorrow's voting, according to election law experts across theideological spectrum, may well be Missouri.
"I feel a little like somebody in New Orleans the weekend before Katrinahit," said St. Louis attorney Mark "Thor" Hearne, who was the chief electionlawyer for the 2004 Bush-Cheney campaign and now is counsel to aconservative group working to prevent voting fraud.
"I really, really, really hope Missouri does not find itself in the crosshairs," he said. But teams of lawyers care ready.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/05/AR2006110501273_pf.html
Trailing Badly, Republicans Take Long-Term Approach
Monday, November 6, 2006; A08
LANCASTER -- Each worshiper attending Sunday services at Fairfield ChristianChurch here received a flier from the Ohio Christian Alliance.
In a handy layout, it offered the positions of top Republican and Democraticcandidates on issues important to the vast congregation: the federalmarriage amendment, abortion, embryonic stem cell research, the words "underGod" in the Pledge of Allegiance and the public display of the TenCommandments.
Pastor Russell Johnson held up the flier and urged his flock southeast ofColumbus to stand firm. He acknowledged that the polls showed the state'stop Republican candidates -- including Sen. Mike DeWine and gubernatorialcontender J. Kenneth Blackwell, both social conservatives -- trailing badly48 hours before polls open.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/06/us/politics/06push.html?ei=5094&en=f79c969e0fb5caba&hp=&ex=1162789200&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print
November 6, 2006
New Telemarketing Ploy Steers Voters on Republican Path
By CHRISTOPHER DREW
An automated voice at the other end of the telephone line asks whether youbelieve that judges who "push homosexual marriage and create new rights likeabortion and sodomy" should be controlled. If your reply is "yes," the voicelets you know that the Democratic candidate in the Senate race in Montana,Jon Tester, is not your man.
In Maryland, a similar question-and-answer sequence suggests that only theRepublican Senate candidate would keep the words "under God" in the Pledgeof Allegiance. In Tennessee, another paints the Democrat as wanting to giveforeign terrorists "the same legal rights and privileges" as Americans.
Using a telemarketing tactic that is best known for steering consumers tobuy products, the organizers of the political telephone calls say they havereached hundreds of thousands of homes in five states over the last severalweeks in a push to win votes for Republicans. Democrats say the callspresent a distorted picture.
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The New York Times
http://select.nytimes.com/2006/11/06/opinion/06koppel.html?pagewanted=print
November 6, 2006
Guest Columnist
The Long, Cost-Free War
By TED KOPPEL
IN the operations center at United States Central Command in Tampa, Fla.,there is a wall of television screens, one end of the wall quartered so thatfour live feeds can be seen simultaneously. The signals originate somewhereover Iraq or Afghanistan. The cameras are aboard pilotless drones.
"Predators," some are called, and predators they are. They can be equippedwith Hellfire missiles that are remotely fired by operators in Nevada whoreceive their orders from Centcom in Florida. The enemy, meanwhile, doesmuch of its killing with improvised explosive devices, the mostsophisticated of which are designed in Iran.
Such is at least one face of modern warfare, in which combatants exchangemortal blows by remote control, once or even twice removed from thebattlefield. The victims are just as dead or mutilated as those in previouswars, but the notion of violence activated from hundreds or even thousandsof miles away is telling.
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The New York Times
http://select.nytimes.com/2006/11/06/opinion/06herbert.html?pagewanted=print
November 6, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist
Shouting Over the Din
By BOB HERBERT
We know that Al Gore got more votes than George W. Bush in the 2000presidential election, and that of the people who went to the polls inFlorida, more had intended to vote for Mr. Gore than for Mr. Bush. But Mr.Bush became president.
In 2004, Mr. Bush outpolled John Kerry by more than three million votesnationally. But widespread problems encountered by voters in Ohio,especially those who had intended to vote for Mr. Kerry, raised doubts aboutwho had really won the crucially important Buckeye State. If Mr. Kerry hadtaken Ohio, he would have won the White House with a minority of the popularvote, as Mr. Bush had done four years earlier.
These are not scenes from a flourishing democracy. If you're looking to puta positive spin on the current state of politics and government in the U.S.,you've got your work cut out for you.
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The New York Times
http://select.nytimes.com/2006/11/06/opinion/06krugman.html?pagewanted=print
November 6, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist
Limiting the Damage
By PAUL KRUGMAN
President Bush isn't on the ballot tomorrow. But this election is,nonetheless, all about him. The question is whether voters will pry hisfingers loose from at least some of the levers of power, thereby limitingthe damage he can inflict in his two remaining years in office.
There are still some people urging Mr. Bush to change course. For example, ascathing editorial published today by The Military Times, which calls on Mr.Bush to fire Donald Rumsfeld, declares that "this is not about the midtermelections." But the editorial's authors surely know better than that. Mr.Bush won't fire Mr. Rumsfeld; he won't change strategy in Iraq; he won'tchange course at all, unless Congress forces him to.
At this point, nobody should have any illusions about Mr. Bush's character.To put it bluntly, he's an insecure bully who believes that owning up to amistake, any mistake, would undermine his manhood - and who therefore livesin a dream world in which all of his policies are succeeding and all of hisofficials are doing a heckuva job. Just last week he declared himself"pleased with the progress we're making" in Iraq.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/06/opinion/06mon3.html?pagewanted=print
November 6, 2006
Editorial
College Sports Get a Warning
The National Collegiate Athletic Association's enthusiasm for fightingcorruption in college sports is partly driven by the fear of federalintervention. That fear came a step closer to being realized last month,when the House Ways and Means Committee fired off a tough-minded letterdemanding that the N.C.A.A. explain how profit-seeking, win-at-all-costathletic departments operate on campus.
The letter showed that Congress has noticed the recruiting violations andthe athletes who sometimes remain eligible to play without progressing or byattending bogus classes. It also implied that the N.C.A.A. might eventuallylose its tax exemptions unless it forces athletic departments to conformmore closely to an educational mission.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/washington/politics-usa-elections-democrats.html
November 5, 2006
U.S. Democrats Appear on Smooth Campaign Ride
By REUTERS
Filed at 10:33 a.m. ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democrats, who have been known to bungle goldenpolitical opportunities, are holding their breath. With just days to gobefore voters could hand them control of the U.S. Congress, their ride hasbeen relatively smooth.
Instead of shooting themselves in the foot, they have sat back and watchedPresident George W. Bush's Republicans do the self destructing, dragged downby influence-peddling and sex scandals, the Iraq war and a slow responselast year to Hurricane Katrina.
Democrats, by comparison, have sustained few self-inflicted wounds andsuffered only a minor scrape last week with Sen. John Kerry's ``botchedjoke'' about Iraq.
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Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-pot4nov04,1,4313867.story
Gathering will mark 10 years of legalized medical pot use
Despite setbacks, veterans of California's pioneering movement willcelebrate.
By Eric Bailey
Times Staff Writer
November 4, 2006
SACRAMENTO - With pomp and a bit of pot-inspired pageantry, thebattle-tested veterans of California's medical marijuana movement will cometogether this weekend to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Proposition 215,the milestone ballot measure that redefined cannabis as medicine.
Those planning to gather today at the Gay Community Center in San Franciscoinclude former cannabis club impresario and Proposition 215 author DennisPeron, celebrated medical marijuana physician Dr. Tod Mikuriya and formerSan Francisco Dist. Atty. Terence Hallinan.
On Nov. 5, 1996, 56% of the California electorate voted to approve theballot measure, igniting a national controversy and putting the statesquarely at odds with the federal government's blanket prohibition on pot.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://releases.usnewswire.com/printing.asp?id=75565
Focus on the Family Stands By Group That Justifies Slavery
11/2/2006 9:36:00 AM
To: City Desk
Contact: Wayne Besen of Truth Wins Out, 917-691-5118, orwbesen@TruthWinsOut.org
ATLANTA, Nov. 2 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Truth Wins Out called on Focus on theFamily today to sever ties with Joseph Nicolosi, the keynote speaker of thisSaturday's Atlanta "ex-gay" Love Won Out conference, after it was discoveredthat the speaker's group, the National Association for Research and Therapyof Homosexuality (NARTH), had racist literature on its website thatjustified slavery.
"It is clear that NARTH's opinions on race are every bit as bizarre anddangerous as their discredited views on homosexuality," said TWO's executivedirector Wayne Besen. "It is disturbing that a politically influential grouplike Focus on the Family is standing by NARTH and is apparently at easepromoting this group and their extreme views. We call on Focus on the Familyto immediately sever ties with NARTH and apologize for giving this hategroup a platform."
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest to
Rays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
Ray's List will be offline on Tuesday - We'll be poll workers!
Be sure to vote!
Ray and Michael
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/judicial/scotus-abortion.htm
O'CONNOR FEARS ASSAULT ON COURT'S INDEPENDENCE
Retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor said she fears judges areunder growing political attack nationwide.
"I'm increasingly concerned about the current climate of challenge tojudicial independence," O'Connor told a gathering of state judges fromaround the country Friday. "Unhappiness with judges today is at a veryintense level."
The judiciary is the weakest of the three branches of government, she said,and therefore the one with "the greatest need to be defended."
The executive and legislative branches have become the attackers, so "theprincipal defenders are going to have to be the people of this country,"with lawyers taking the lead, she said.
=
The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/nation/15939848.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Mon, Nov. 06, 2006
Change may be afoot in the South
Many political contests in the South, such as the U.S Senate racebetween black Democrat Harold Ford Jr. and Bob Corker, illustrate theregion's changing political face, which could mean a reversal of itsRepublican tide.
BY AUDRA D.S. BURCH
aburch@MiamiHerald.com
NASHVILLE - Standing on the edge of a dusty flatbed, Harold Ford Jr.delivers a speech of promise in a horse stable just outside the city. Here,in a rural patch 38 miles from downtown, Ford, a five-term Congressman, isdistinguished by his European-cut navy suit and cowboy boots, his polishedway, his celebrity appeal.
But the U.S. Senate candidate, a black Democrat who hopes to rewritehistory in a state that twice carried President Bush to the White House, hascharmed the crowd with his centrist talk. He's connected with thispolitically diverse audience who showed up for bowls of chili, country tunesand possibly change.
=
The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/nationworld/ats-ap_politics11nov06,0,3952157.story
Parties Work to Turn Out Voters
November 6, 2006, 4:24 AM EST
WASHINGTON -- A day before midterm elections, both parties are focused onturning out voters in the battle for control of Congress.
Republicans and Democrats have sent thousands of volunteers to states withthe most contested races to work phone banks and canvass neighborhoods. Bothparties also have assembled legal teams for possible challengers in case ofvoting problems.
Up for grabs are 435 House seats, 33 Senate seats, governorships in 36states, and thousands of state legislative and local races. In 37 states,voters also will determine the fate of ballot initiatives, including whetherto ban gay marriage, raise the minimum wage, endorse expanded embryonic stemcell research and -- in South Dakota -- impose the country's most stringentabortion restrictions.
Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., hoping to become the first female Housespeaker, stumped for Democratic challengers in the Northeast on Sunday.
=
The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/business/local/sfl-ybtech06nov06,0,5680003.column?coll=sfla-business-front
Make sure your wireless network isn't open to everyone
Robyn A. Friedman
Real estate and technology
November 6, 2006
Vasco Bilbao never thought about securing his home wireless network.
He accessed the Internet via a cable from his laptop to a wireless router,and he thought his connection was secure since he wasn't using the network'swireless capability. Then his connection speed slowed to a crawl, and hislaptop settings started changing -- on their own.
"I'd go onto my laptop, and it would be like a different laptop," saidBilbao, who lives in Miami. "Even my icons were changed."
Bilbao got nervous because he did his banking online. So he called in theGeek Squad, a 24-hour computer support service launched in 1994 that becamea subsidiary of Minneapolis-based Best Buy Co. Inc. in 2000.
Bilbao learned that his wireless router created an open network -- a networkthat, without proper security, was being accessed by others. Ray Lopez, theWest Kendall-based Geek Squad agent who responded to Bilbao's call, did somesimple tweaks to the system. In about 30 minutes, he added encryption andchanged the SSID, the "name" of the wireless network that is broadcast toall wireless devices within range.
=
Washingtonpost.com
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/05/AR2006110501260_pf.html
In Missouri, a Forecast for Voter Misery
By Amy Goldstein and Peter Slevin
Monday, November 6, 2006; A06
Move over, Florida. You, too, Ohio. The state most ripe for voting disputesin tomorrow's voting, according to election law experts across theideological spectrum, may well be Missouri.
"I feel a little like somebody in New Orleans the weekend before Katrinahit," said St. Louis attorney Mark "Thor" Hearne, who was the chief electionlawyer for the 2004 Bush-Cheney campaign and now is counsel to aconservative group working to prevent voting fraud.
"I really, really, really hope Missouri does not find itself in the crosshairs," he said. But teams of lawyers care ready.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/05/AR2006110501273_pf.html
Trailing Badly, Republicans Take Long-Term Approach
Monday, November 6, 2006; A08
LANCASTER -- Each worshiper attending Sunday services at Fairfield ChristianChurch here received a flier from the Ohio Christian Alliance.
In a handy layout, it offered the positions of top Republican and Democraticcandidates on issues important to the vast congregation: the federalmarriage amendment, abortion, embryonic stem cell research, the words "underGod" in the Pledge of Allegiance and the public display of the TenCommandments.
Pastor Russell Johnson held up the flier and urged his flock southeast ofColumbus to stand firm. He acknowledged that the polls showed the state'stop Republican candidates -- including Sen. Mike DeWine and gubernatorialcontender J. Kenneth Blackwell, both social conservatives -- trailing badly48 hours before polls open.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/06/us/politics/06push.html?ei=5094&en=f79c969e0fb5caba&hp=&ex=1162789200&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print
November 6, 2006
New Telemarketing Ploy Steers Voters on Republican Path
By CHRISTOPHER DREW
An automated voice at the other end of the telephone line asks whether youbelieve that judges who "push homosexual marriage and create new rights likeabortion and sodomy" should be controlled. If your reply is "yes," the voicelets you know that the Democratic candidate in the Senate race in Montana,Jon Tester, is not your man.
In Maryland, a similar question-and-answer sequence suggests that only theRepublican Senate candidate would keep the words "under God" in the Pledgeof Allegiance. In Tennessee, another paints the Democrat as wanting to giveforeign terrorists "the same legal rights and privileges" as Americans.
Using a telemarketing tactic that is best known for steering consumers tobuy products, the organizers of the political telephone calls say they havereached hundreds of thousands of homes in five states over the last severalweeks in a push to win votes for Republicans. Democrats say the callspresent a distorted picture.
=
The New York Times
http://select.nytimes.com/2006/11/06/opinion/06koppel.html?pagewanted=print
November 6, 2006
Guest Columnist
The Long, Cost-Free War
By TED KOPPEL
IN the operations center at United States Central Command in Tampa, Fla.,there is a wall of television screens, one end of the wall quartered so thatfour live feeds can be seen simultaneously. The signals originate somewhereover Iraq or Afghanistan. The cameras are aboard pilotless drones.
"Predators," some are called, and predators they are. They can be equippedwith Hellfire missiles that are remotely fired by operators in Nevada whoreceive their orders from Centcom in Florida. The enemy, meanwhile, doesmuch of its killing with improvised explosive devices, the mostsophisticated of which are designed in Iran.
Such is at least one face of modern warfare, in which combatants exchangemortal blows by remote control, once or even twice removed from thebattlefield. The victims are just as dead or mutilated as those in previouswars, but the notion of violence activated from hundreds or even thousandsof miles away is telling.
=
The New York Times
http://select.nytimes.com/2006/11/06/opinion/06herbert.html?pagewanted=print
November 6, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist
Shouting Over the Din
By BOB HERBERT
We know that Al Gore got more votes than George W. Bush in the 2000presidential election, and that of the people who went to the polls inFlorida, more had intended to vote for Mr. Gore than for Mr. Bush. But Mr.Bush became president.
In 2004, Mr. Bush outpolled John Kerry by more than three million votesnationally. But widespread problems encountered by voters in Ohio,especially those who had intended to vote for Mr. Kerry, raised doubts aboutwho had really won the crucially important Buckeye State. If Mr. Kerry hadtaken Ohio, he would have won the White House with a minority of the popularvote, as Mr. Bush had done four years earlier.
These are not scenes from a flourishing democracy. If you're looking to puta positive spin on the current state of politics and government in the U.S.,you've got your work cut out for you.
=
The New York Times
http://select.nytimes.com/2006/11/06/opinion/06krugman.html?pagewanted=print
November 6, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist
Limiting the Damage
By PAUL KRUGMAN
President Bush isn't on the ballot tomorrow. But this election is,nonetheless, all about him. The question is whether voters will pry hisfingers loose from at least some of the levers of power, thereby limitingthe damage he can inflict in his two remaining years in office.
There are still some people urging Mr. Bush to change course. For example, ascathing editorial published today by The Military Times, which calls on Mr.Bush to fire Donald Rumsfeld, declares that "this is not about the midtermelections." But the editorial's authors surely know better than that. Mr.Bush won't fire Mr. Rumsfeld; he won't change strategy in Iraq; he won'tchange course at all, unless Congress forces him to.
At this point, nobody should have any illusions about Mr. Bush's character.To put it bluntly, he's an insecure bully who believes that owning up to amistake, any mistake, would undermine his manhood - and who therefore livesin a dream world in which all of his policies are succeeding and all of hisofficials are doing a heckuva job. Just last week he declared himself"pleased with the progress we're making" in Iraq.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/06/opinion/06mon3.html?pagewanted=print
November 6, 2006
Editorial
College Sports Get a Warning
The National Collegiate Athletic Association's enthusiasm for fightingcorruption in college sports is partly driven by the fear of federalintervention. That fear came a step closer to being realized last month,when the House Ways and Means Committee fired off a tough-minded letterdemanding that the N.C.A.A. explain how profit-seeking, win-at-all-costathletic departments operate on campus.
The letter showed that Congress has noticed the recruiting violations andthe athletes who sometimes remain eligible to play without progressing or byattending bogus classes. It also implied that the N.C.A.A. might eventuallylose its tax exemptions unless it forces athletic departments to conformmore closely to an educational mission.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/washington/politics-usa-elections-democrats.html
November 5, 2006
U.S. Democrats Appear on Smooth Campaign Ride
By REUTERS
Filed at 10:33 a.m. ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democrats, who have been known to bungle goldenpolitical opportunities, are holding their breath. With just days to gobefore voters could hand them control of the U.S. Congress, their ride hasbeen relatively smooth.
Instead of shooting themselves in the foot, they have sat back and watchedPresident George W. Bush's Republicans do the self destructing, dragged downby influence-peddling and sex scandals, the Iraq war and a slow responselast year to Hurricane Katrina.
Democrats, by comparison, have sustained few self-inflicted wounds andsuffered only a minor scrape last week with Sen. John Kerry's ``botchedjoke'' about Iraq.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-pot4nov04,1,4313867.story
Gathering will mark 10 years of legalized medical pot use
Despite setbacks, veterans of California's pioneering movement willcelebrate.
By Eric Bailey
Times Staff Writer
November 4, 2006
SACRAMENTO - With pomp and a bit of pot-inspired pageantry, thebattle-tested veterans of California's medical marijuana movement will cometogether this weekend to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Proposition 215,the milestone ballot measure that redefined cannabis as medicine.
Those planning to gather today at the Gay Community Center in San Franciscoinclude former cannabis club impresario and Proposition 215 author DennisPeron, celebrated medical marijuana physician Dr. Tod Mikuriya and formerSan Francisco Dist. Atty. Terence Hallinan.
On Nov. 5, 1996, 56% of the California electorate voted to approve theballot measure, igniting a national controversy and putting the statesquarely at odds with the federal government's blanket prohibition on pot.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://releases.usnewswire.com/printing.asp?id=75565
Focus on the Family Stands By Group That Justifies Slavery
11/2/2006 9:36:00 AM
To: City Desk
Contact: Wayne Besen of Truth Wins Out, 917-691-5118, orwbesen@TruthWinsOut.org
ATLANTA, Nov. 2 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Truth Wins Out called on Focus on theFamily today to sever ties with Joseph Nicolosi, the keynote speaker of thisSaturday's Atlanta "ex-gay" Love Won Out conference, after it was discoveredthat the speaker's group, the National Association for Research and Therapyof Homosexuality (NARTH), had racist literature on its website thatjustified slavery.
"It is clear that NARTH's opinions on race are every bit as bizarre anddangerous as their discredited views on homosexuality," said TWO's executivedirector Wayne Besen. "It is disturbing that a politically influential grouplike Focus on the Family is standing by NARTH and is apparently at easepromoting this group and their extreme views. We call on Focus on the Familyto immediately sever ties with NARTH and apologize for giving this hategroup a platform."
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest to
Rays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
Sunday, November 05, 2006
GLBT DIGEST - November 5, 2006
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US AT
rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
Tight Battle Over SD Anti-Gay Amendment
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
November 3, 2006 - 9:00 pm ET
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon06/11/110306sdPoll.htm
(Sioux Falls, South Dakota) A new poll shows voters in South Dakota equallydivided over a proposed amendment that would bar same-sex marriage in thestate.
The Mason-Dixon poll for the Argus Leader shows that 47 percent of likelyvoters oppose the amendment and 46 percent support it. In the four daysleft before voters go to the polls both sides on the issue are targeting theseven percent who have not yet made up their minds.
In addition to banning gay marriage the proposed amendment would block civilunions, domestic partnerships, and all "quasi-marital"relationships.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.sexualintelligence.org/
Sexual Intelligence
An Electronic Newsletter
Written and published by Marty Klein, Ph.D.
Issue #64 -- June 2005
Issue #81 -- November 2006
Contents
Austrian Parliament Celebrates Austrians
Civilization: The Ultimate Danger
Mark Foley: "Them" or "Us?"
Liquor Banned From Non-Existent Strip Clubs
New Jersey Court: Gays Are Human
How They Do It
Austrian Parliament Celebrates Austrians
Observe Gay Pride Month in Congress? With greetings from Queen Elizabeth?That's the equivalent of what happened last month in Vienna, Austria'scapital--the first national Parliament to honor a gay-lesbian organization.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/04/AR2006110400381.html
Female Bishop Takes Helm of Episcopal Church
1st Woman to Lead Denomination Vows to Seek Healing
By Alan Cooperman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, November 5, 2006; A18
Wearing multicolored vestments that represent a new dawn, Bishop KatharineJefferts Schori formally took office yesterday as the first woman to leadthe Episcopal Church and promised to seek healing and wholeness in adenomination threatened by schism.
Jefferts Schori, 52, a pilot, rock climber and former oceanographer whosesurprise election in June deepened existing rifts over homosexuality and theauthority of scripture, did not delve into those issues in her openingsermon as presiding bishop. But she did call for peace, intoning the Hebrewword "shalom" no fewer than seven times.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/03/AR2006110301451_pf.html
Please Say 'I Don't'
By Dahlia Lithwick
Sunday, November 5, 2006; B02
Virginia voters will go to the polls this week to decide whether to amendthe state constitution not only to ban same-sex marriage, but also to refuseto recognize any legal arrangement between "unmarried individuals" -- gay orstraight -- that confers marriage-like benefits. The ballot initiative isshocking, not only in its bigotry against all unmarried couples, but in itsattempt to transform a constitution -- a document meant to lay out ourhighest freedoms and aspirations -- into a vicious cudgel to separate "us"from "them."
The voters of Virginia have already made their feelings about same-sexmarriage clear: State statutes prohibit civil unions and marriages betweensame-sex couples. Virginia law also nullifies civil unions solemnized in anyother state.
=
The New York Times
http://select.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/opinion/05kristof.html?pagewanted=print
November 5, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist
Abortion, Condoms and Bush
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
It seemed the perfect way to shame President Bush for disregarding the poor:I suggested that he had presided over a surge in abortions.
In that column two years ago, I cited a study indicating that the abortionrate had risen sharply after Mr. Bush took office. Conservatives protestedfuriously, saying that the figures weren't reliable.
Now we do have better statistics, and my conservative critics seem to havebeen right.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention do show a tiny increase inabortions in 2002 (the most recent year available). But more comprehensivefigures from the Guttmacher Institute, which does research on reproductivehealth, indicate that abortions fell - albeit by tiny amounts - in the firstthree years of Mr. Bush's presidency.
=
The New York Times
http://select.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/opinion/05rich.html?pagewanted=print
November 5, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist
Throw the Truthiness Bums Out
By FRANK RICH
EACH voter will have a favorite moment from the fabulous midterms of 2006.Forced to pick my own, I'd go for Lynne Cheney's pre-Halloween slapdown ofWolf Blitzer on CNN. It's not in every political campaign that you get towatch the wife of the vice president of the United States slug it out aboutlesbian sex while promoting a children's book titled "Our 50 States: AFamily Adventure Across America."
The pretext for this improbable dust-up was a last-ditch strategy by theflailing incumbent Republican senator of Virginia, George Allen. Desperateto resuscitate his campaign, Senator Allen attacked his opponent, Jim Webb,for writing sexually explicit passages in his acclaimed novels about theVietnam War. Mr. Webb fought back by pointing out, among other Republicanhypocrisies, Mrs. Cheney's authorship of an out-of-print 1981 novel,"Sisters," with steamy sexual interludes suitable for "The L Word."
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/news/news-religion-evangelical-scandal.html?pagewanted=print
November 4, 2006
Pastor to Resign From Church Amid Sex Scandal
By REUTERS
Filed at 8:55 p.m. ET
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (Reuters) - Disgraced evangelist Ted Haggard agreedto resign as pastor of the New Life Church in Colorado after the church'sboard found he committed ''sexually immoral conduct,'' church officials saidon Saturday.
Haggard, a vocal opponent of gay marriage, resigned as president of theNational Association of Evangelicals on Thursday after being accused by amale escort of having had a sexual relationship with him and using the drugmethamphetamine, better known by its street name ``meth.''
He also had stepped down temporarily as senior pastor of New Life Church inColorado Springs, a 14,000-member ''Mega-Church.''
=
Anti-gay riot sparks Israeli high alert
Hassan Mirza
GAY.COM
1 November, 2006
A riot erupted Tuesday night as hundreds of ultra Orthodox Jews marched toprotest next months' Jerusalem Pride.
Members of the Haredi sect created massive uproar: blocking roads, settingrubbish bins on fire, and throwing rocks at police officers. Protestors wereled by leaders wearing sack cloths, a Biblical sign of bereavement, andcarrying placards slamming homosexuality that said "Jerusalem will not belike Sodom and Gomorrah".
Police cited similar disturbances around Israel on Tuesday.
The riot followed the Jerusalem police chief's significant decision to placethe force on an "Emergency Alert", raising the national alert to its highestlevel relative to current scenarios.
According to the Jerusalem Post the current police situation in response tothe protests resembles that of the 2005 pullout from the Gaza Strip, withall police holidays suspended to ensure maximum manpower on the day of theparade, November 11.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest to
Rays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
Tight Battle Over SD Anti-Gay Amendment
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
November 3, 2006 - 9:00 pm ET
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon06/11/110306sdPoll.htm
(Sioux Falls, South Dakota) A new poll shows voters in South Dakota equallydivided over a proposed amendment that would bar same-sex marriage in thestate.
The Mason-Dixon poll for the Argus Leader shows that 47 percent of likelyvoters oppose the amendment and 46 percent support it. In the four daysleft before voters go to the polls both sides on the issue are targeting theseven percent who have not yet made up their minds.
In addition to banning gay marriage the proposed amendment would block civilunions, domestic partnerships, and all "quasi-marital"relationships.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.sexualintelligence.org/
Sexual Intelligence
An Electronic Newsletter
Written and published by Marty Klein, Ph.D.
Issue #64 -- June 2005
Issue #81 -- November 2006
Contents
Austrian Parliament Celebrates Austrians
Civilization: The Ultimate Danger
Mark Foley: "Them" or "Us?"
Liquor Banned From Non-Existent Strip Clubs
New Jersey Court: Gays Are Human
How They Do It
Austrian Parliament Celebrates Austrians
Observe Gay Pride Month in Congress? With greetings from Queen Elizabeth?That's the equivalent of what happened last month in Vienna, Austria'scapital--the first national Parliament to honor a gay-lesbian organization.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/04/AR2006110400381.html
Female Bishop Takes Helm of Episcopal Church
1st Woman to Lead Denomination Vows to Seek Healing
By Alan Cooperman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, November 5, 2006; A18
Wearing multicolored vestments that represent a new dawn, Bishop KatharineJefferts Schori formally took office yesterday as the first woman to leadthe Episcopal Church and promised to seek healing and wholeness in adenomination threatened by schism.
Jefferts Schori, 52, a pilot, rock climber and former oceanographer whosesurprise election in June deepened existing rifts over homosexuality and theauthority of scripture, did not delve into those issues in her openingsermon as presiding bishop. But she did call for peace, intoning the Hebrewword "shalom" no fewer than seven times.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/03/AR2006110301451_pf.html
Please Say 'I Don't'
By Dahlia Lithwick
Sunday, November 5, 2006; B02
Virginia voters will go to the polls this week to decide whether to amendthe state constitution not only to ban same-sex marriage, but also to refuseto recognize any legal arrangement between "unmarried individuals" -- gay orstraight -- that confers marriage-like benefits. The ballot initiative isshocking, not only in its bigotry against all unmarried couples, but in itsattempt to transform a constitution -- a document meant to lay out ourhighest freedoms and aspirations -- into a vicious cudgel to separate "us"from "them."
The voters of Virginia have already made their feelings about same-sexmarriage clear: State statutes prohibit civil unions and marriages betweensame-sex couples. Virginia law also nullifies civil unions solemnized in anyother state.
=
The New York Times
http://select.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/opinion/05kristof.html?pagewanted=print
November 5, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist
Abortion, Condoms and Bush
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
It seemed the perfect way to shame President Bush for disregarding the poor:I suggested that he had presided over a surge in abortions.
In that column two years ago, I cited a study indicating that the abortionrate had risen sharply after Mr. Bush took office. Conservatives protestedfuriously, saying that the figures weren't reliable.
Now we do have better statistics, and my conservative critics seem to havebeen right.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention do show a tiny increase inabortions in 2002 (the most recent year available). But more comprehensivefigures from the Guttmacher Institute, which does research on reproductivehealth, indicate that abortions fell - albeit by tiny amounts - in the firstthree years of Mr. Bush's presidency.
=
The New York Times
http://select.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/opinion/05rich.html?pagewanted=print
November 5, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist
Throw the Truthiness Bums Out
By FRANK RICH
EACH voter will have a favorite moment from the fabulous midterms of 2006.Forced to pick my own, I'd go for Lynne Cheney's pre-Halloween slapdown ofWolf Blitzer on CNN. It's not in every political campaign that you get towatch the wife of the vice president of the United States slug it out aboutlesbian sex while promoting a children's book titled "Our 50 States: AFamily Adventure Across America."
The pretext for this improbable dust-up was a last-ditch strategy by theflailing incumbent Republican senator of Virginia, George Allen. Desperateto resuscitate his campaign, Senator Allen attacked his opponent, Jim Webb,for writing sexually explicit passages in his acclaimed novels about theVietnam War. Mr. Webb fought back by pointing out, among other Republicanhypocrisies, Mrs. Cheney's authorship of an out-of-print 1981 novel,"Sisters," with steamy sexual interludes suitable for "The L Word."
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/news/news-religion-evangelical-scandal.html?pagewanted=print
November 4, 2006
Pastor to Resign From Church Amid Sex Scandal
By REUTERS
Filed at 8:55 p.m. ET
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (Reuters) - Disgraced evangelist Ted Haggard agreedto resign as pastor of the New Life Church in Colorado after the church'sboard found he committed ''sexually immoral conduct,'' church officials saidon Saturday.
Haggard, a vocal opponent of gay marriage, resigned as president of theNational Association of Evangelicals on Thursday after being accused by amale escort of having had a sexual relationship with him and using the drugmethamphetamine, better known by its street name ``meth.''
He also had stepped down temporarily as senior pastor of New Life Church inColorado Springs, a 14,000-member ''Mega-Church.''
=
Anti-gay riot sparks Israeli high alert
Hassan Mirza
GAY.COM
1 November, 2006
A riot erupted Tuesday night as hundreds of ultra Orthodox Jews marched toprotest next months' Jerusalem Pride.
Members of the Haredi sect created massive uproar: blocking roads, settingrubbish bins on fire, and throwing rocks at police officers. Protestors wereled by leaders wearing sack cloths, a Biblical sign of bereavement, andcarrying placards slamming homosexuality that said "Jerusalem will not belike Sodom and Gomorrah".
Police cited similar disturbances around Israel on Tuesday.
The riot followed the Jerusalem police chief's significant decision to placethe force on an "Emergency Alert", raising the national alert to its highestlevel relative to current scenarios.
According to the Jerusalem Post the current police situation in response tothe protests resembles that of the 2005 pullout from the Gaza Strip, withall police holidays suspended to ensure maximum manpower on the day of theparade, November 11.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest to
Rays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
NATIONAL & WORLD DIGEST NOVEMBER 5, 2006
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US AT
rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
The Miami Herald
November 5, 2006
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/columnists/15923366.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
What to recall, what to forget on Election Day
By CARL HIAASEN
The latest New York Times/CBS poll shows that only 29 percent of Americansapprove of how President Bush is handling the war in Iraq.
That's terrible news for Republicans on the eve of mid-term elections. Whilesome frantically try to distance themselves from the president, others arefrantically trying to distract voters.
Please worry about illegal immigration, they say.
Worry about gay marriages.
Worry about income taxes.
Worry about the stand-up comedy career of John Kerry.
But please, please put the ongoing debacle in Iraq out of your mind when youwalk into the voting booth.
=
The Boston Globe
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2006/11/05/prejudging_the_judges?mode=PF
Prejudging the judges
November 5, 2006
CONSERVATIVES have a new cause to rally the faithful at the polls in this week's national election: those scary activist judges. Constitutional amendments are on the ballot in six states that would curb judicial authority in novel and dangerous ways. Wise voters will resist the hyperbole about judges run amok. The nation's founders held high the principle of an independent judiciary, and that should not be undermined by the political whims of the moment.
In Colorado, a ballot proposal would impose 10-year term limits on appellate judges, even though judges in that state already face retention elections every 10 years. The term limits would be retroactive, so some of the state's top judges could be summarily replaced. In Oregon, an initiative provides for the election of top judges by district instead of statewide, to diminish the influence of Portland's liberal voters. In North Dakota,a proposal would severely curtail the discretion judges have in settling custody disputes.
=
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/world/asia/05afghan.html?ei=5094&en=15e599b2e639e35a&hp=&ex=1162789200&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print
November 5, 2006
C.I.A. Review Highlights Afghan Leader's Woes
By DAVID ROHDE and JAMES RISEN
HERAT, Afghanistan, Nov. 4 - A recent Central Intelligence Agency assessmentfound that the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, had been significantlyweakened by rising popular frustration with his American-backed government,American officials say.
The assessment found that Mr. Karzai's government and security forcescontinued to struggle to exert authority beyond Kabul, said a seniorAmerican official who spoke only on the condition of anonymity. Theassessment also found that increasing numbers of Afghans viewed Mr. Karzai'sgovernment as corrupt, failing to deliver promised reconstruction and tooweak to protect the country from rising Taliban attacks.
=
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/world/middleeast/05cnd-saddam.html?hp&ex=1162789200&en=55feeded58d269df&ei=5094&partner=homepage
November 5, 2006
Saddam Hussein Is Sentenced to Death
By KIRK SEMPLE
BAGHDAD, Nov. 5 - An Iraqi special tribunal today convicted Saddam Husseinof crimes against humanity and sentenced him to death by hanging for thebrutal repression of a Shiite town in the 1980s.
As the verdict was read, Mr. Hussein shouted, "Long live the people! Longlive the Arab nation! Down with the spies!" He then chanted "God is great."The chief judge, Raouf Rasheed Abdul Rahman, tried to calm Mr. Hussein down."There's no point," Mr. Rahman said.
The five-judge panel, which heard more than nine months of testimony in thecase, also issued death sentences for two of his seven co-defendants: BarzanIbrahim al-Tikriti, Mr. Hussein's half-brother, who was head of Iraq'sdomestic intelligence agency; and Awad al-Bandar, president of Mr. Hussein'srevolutionary court.
=
The Sacramento Bee
http://www.sacbee.com/110/v-print/story/71403.html
Editorial: Another reason to vote 'No' on Proposition 83
-
Published 12:00 am PST Sunday, November 5, 2006
Voters who worry about protecting children from sexual predators haveanother reason to vote No on Proposition 83. The initiative, dubbed"Jessica's Law" by its backers, bars sexual offenders on parole from livingwithin 2,000 feet of a park or school and requires them to wear globalpositioning devices for life. Supporters claim those provisions will betterprotect the public. Sadly, it will likely have the opposite effect, as adraft analysis of the measure prepared by state corrections officialspredicts.
The Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation is gearing up to implementthe initiative. Analysts who wrote the department's report anticipate that,rather than comply with its onerous restrictions, "many will simply chooseto abscond supervision" and that "this will place the community at greaterrisk." A department spokesman downplayed the draft, saying the statements init "probably should not have been so sweeping."
=
The Sacramento Bee
http://www.sacbee.com/110/v-print/story/71369.html
George F. Will: Election night,doing the math on the sidelines
By George F. Will -
Published 12:00 am PST Sunday, November 5, 2006
As ballpark vendors say, you can't enjoy the game without a score card. Hereis one for Tuesday night.
. The election actually began four weeks ago, with early voting.
Passion drives turnout; anger is a passion; contentment is not. Is thereanger at incumbents generally, or only at Republican incumbents? Two yearsago, 162 incumbents in each party (78 percent of Republicans re-elected and87 percent of Democrats) won with at least 60 percent.
Only 21 incumbents won with 55 percent or less. Will these numbers -- andthe 98.6 re-election rate for incumbents since 1996 -- change dramatically?
. In the 14 presidential elections since 1952, only once (1964) didDemocrats win more than 50 percent of the suburban vote. Last May, a GallupPoll measured President Bush's approval among suburban voters at 29 percent.
=
The Washington Post
Two Tales of War: Read 'Em and Weep
By Colbert I. King
Saturday, November 4, 2006; A23
Maybe it was the memory of the turbulent time I spent in the StateDepartment as the Vietnam War escalated. Perhaps it was the names of HowardUniversity classmates on the wall of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. Or maybeit was just the recollection of the arrogance, prevarication and outrightlies by the government during the Vietnam era that caused a sick feeling inthe pit of my stomach as I read "State of Denial," Bob Woodward's insidelook at the Bush administration and the Iraq debacle.
How in the world could we be reliving a nightmare like Vietnam?
To be sure, that war and Iraq are different in the number of casualties, thegeography and the enemy. But there are ghostly similarities. Writing aboutVietnam in his book "My American Journey," Gen. Colin Powell made itabundantly clear that U.S. policymakers had almost no understanding of whatthey had gotten themselves into. Woodward makes the same point aboutPresident Bush and his advisers, and in excruciating detail. Vietnam was aquagmire; so is Iraq.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/weekinreview/05greenhouse.html?pagewanted=print
November 5, 2006
Kennedy's Choice
The Roberts Court Takes on Abortion
By LINDA GREENHOUSE
WASHINGTON
THE arguments the Supreme Court will hear on Wednesday on theconstitutionality of the federal Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act promise muchmore than a resumption of a familiar debate over a method of terminating apregnancy.
In defining the permissible limits on access to abortion, only six yearsafter declaring a similar restriction unconstitutional in a case fromNebraska, the court must go a long way toward defining its stance towardprecedent, its relationship to Congress, and its view of its own role in theconstitutional system. As it decides the new cases, the still-emergingRoberts court will inevitably be defining itself.
=
The New York Times
http://select.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/opinion/05brooks.html?pagewanted=print
November 5, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist
The Fighting Democrat
By DAVID BROOKS
Once upon a time, the Democrats were the majority party, but then came the1960s and many middle-class whites like Jim Webb drifted away. Webb servedheroically in Vietnam and came back disgusted with the liberal elites whoreviled the military and, as he wrote in 1997, "were trying to destroy thefoundations of American society."
"Jane Fonda can kiss my [behind]," he once told a radio interviewer in thebracing and irrepressible manner that is his trademark. "I wouldn't goacross the street to watch her slit her wrist."
Webb found himself at Georgetown Law School. "Webb came to view the majorityof his fellow students as the most miserable, neurotic and obsessivecollection of individuals he had ever met," Robert Timberg wrote in "TheNightingale's Song."
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/opinion/05hicks.html?pagewanted=print
November 5, 2006
Op-Ed Contributor
Separate but Equal
By ROBERT HICKS
Franklin, Tenn.
HAROLD FORD, the Democratic representative running for senator in Tennessee,has surprised most of us with his formidable campaign against Bob Corker,the former mayor of Chattanooga, for Bill Frist's seat.
Yet, if truth were known, Mr. Ford's electability seems to be based on whathe has in common with Mr. Corker and not where they differ. Ironic, when youthink about how important this election is, not just for Tennessee, but forthe nation as a whole.
This election is so important that the Republican National Committee createda nasty little ad that included an attractive white woman saying to Mr.Ford, "Call me." The ad, we are told, was a parody, making pointed fun ofMr. Ford's once having attended a party sponsored by Playboy magazine. Butwhat it really did was play to the old fears of miscegenation that many ofmy fellow white Tennesseans haven't been able to strip from their gene pool.It was a crummy, low blow, and I respect Mr. Corker for asking the nationalcommittee to pull it when, in other elections, candidates have been willingto let such garbage be broadcast while claiming they have no control overwhat others put out.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/opinion/05sun1.html?pagewanted=print
The Difference Two Years Made
On Tuesday, when this page runs the list of people it has endorsed forelection, we will include no Republican Congressional candidates for thefirst time in our memory. Although Times editorials tend to agree withDemocrats on national policy, we have proudly and consistently endorsed along line of moderate Republicans, particularly for the House. Our onlypolitical loyalty is to making the two-party system as vital and responsibleas possible.
That is why things are different this year.
To begin with, the Republican majority that has run the House - and for themost part, the Senate - during President Bush's tenure has done a terriblejob on the basics. Its tax-cutting-above-all-else has wrecked the budget,hobbled the middle class and endangered the long-term economy. It hasrefused to face up to global warming and done pathetically little about thecountry's dependence on foreign oil.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/washington/politics-usa-elections-churches.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print
November 4, 2006
U.S. Churches Sharply Divided on Iraq War
By REUTERS
Filed at 8:33 a.m. ET
DALLAS (Reuters) - America's churches are still sharply divided on the warin Iraq as their flocks prepare to go to the polls, although backing for theconflict has dimmed even among the once solidly supportive evangelicalcommunity.
Public opposition to the war -- polls show a solid majority of more than 60percent of Americans opposed -- is seen as a major reason President GeorgeW. Bush's Republican Party is battling to retain control of the U.S.Congress in Tuesday's elections.
And with far higher church attendance rates in the United States than inother parts of the rich industrialized world church stances on the war, ason other issues, loom large in politics.
=
http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_anthony__061103_the_dawning_of_karl_.htm
November 3, 2006 at 12:10:30
The Dawning of Karl Rove's October Surprise
by Anthony Wade
http://www.opednews.com
November 3, 2006
I was thinking all week what surprise Karl Rove had for America before theelections. Friday afternoon was when I expected it, but then it came to me.I had forgotten all about the true surprise he has waiting for America.
In 2004, on the Friday before the election, Karl Rove put out a "new" fakeOsama bin Laden tape, designed to scare voters to vote for Bush. It wasprecisely released after the Washington Press Corps had gone home for theweekend, so that it would receive unfettered coverage for three straightdays heading into the presidential election. By the time the analystsfigured out that it was clearly designed to help Bush, he was alreadyaccepting concession from John Kerry.
=
Today's commentary:
http://www.zmag.org/sustainers/content/2006-11/03pilger.cfm
ZNet Commentary
The Blair Doctrine: Blood & Money
November 03, 2006
By John Pilger
On 17 October, President Bush signed a bill that legalised torture and kidnapping and effectively repealed the Bill of Rights and habeas corpus. The CIA can now legally abduct people and "render" them to secret prisons in countries where they are likely to be tortured. Evidence extracted under torture is now permissible in "military commissions"; people can be sentenced to death based on testimony beaten out of witnesses. You are now guilty until confirmed guilty. And you are a "terrorist" if you commit what George Orwell, in Nineteen Eighty-Four, called "thoughtcrimes". Bush has revived the prerogatives of the Tudor and Stuart monarchs: the power of unrestricted lawlessness. "America can be proud," said Senator Lindsey Graham, one of the bill's promoters, who stood with other congressmen, clapping as Bush signed away the American constitution and the essence of American democracy.
The historic significance of this was barely acknowledged in Britain, the source of these abandoned ancient rights, no doubt because the same barbarians' law is taking hold here. The great crime of Iraq is a moral tsunami that has left New Labour's vassals floundering and shouting their hopeless inversions of the truth as they await rescue by Washington.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest to
Rays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
The Miami Herald
November 5, 2006
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/columnists/15923366.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
What to recall, what to forget on Election Day
By CARL HIAASEN
The latest New York Times/CBS poll shows that only 29 percent of Americansapprove of how President Bush is handling the war in Iraq.
That's terrible news for Republicans on the eve of mid-term elections. Whilesome frantically try to distance themselves from the president, others arefrantically trying to distract voters.
Please worry about illegal immigration, they say.
Worry about gay marriages.
Worry about income taxes.
Worry about the stand-up comedy career of John Kerry.
But please, please put the ongoing debacle in Iraq out of your mind when youwalk into the voting booth.
=
The Boston Globe
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2006/11/05/prejudging_the_judges?mode=PF
Prejudging the judges
November 5, 2006
CONSERVATIVES have a new cause to rally the faithful at the polls in this week's national election: those scary activist judges. Constitutional amendments are on the ballot in six states that would curb judicial authority in novel and dangerous ways. Wise voters will resist the hyperbole about judges run amok. The nation's founders held high the principle of an independent judiciary, and that should not be undermined by the political whims of the moment.
In Colorado, a ballot proposal would impose 10-year term limits on appellate judges, even though judges in that state already face retention elections every 10 years. The term limits would be retroactive, so some of the state's top judges could be summarily replaced. In Oregon, an initiative provides for the election of top judges by district instead of statewide, to diminish the influence of Portland's liberal voters. In North Dakota,a proposal would severely curtail the discretion judges have in settling custody disputes.
=
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/world/asia/05afghan.html?ei=5094&en=15e599b2e639e35a&hp=&ex=1162789200&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print
November 5, 2006
C.I.A. Review Highlights Afghan Leader's Woes
By DAVID ROHDE and JAMES RISEN
HERAT, Afghanistan, Nov. 4 - A recent Central Intelligence Agency assessmentfound that the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, had been significantlyweakened by rising popular frustration with his American-backed government,American officials say.
The assessment found that Mr. Karzai's government and security forcescontinued to struggle to exert authority beyond Kabul, said a seniorAmerican official who spoke only on the condition of anonymity. Theassessment also found that increasing numbers of Afghans viewed Mr. Karzai'sgovernment as corrupt, failing to deliver promised reconstruction and tooweak to protect the country from rising Taliban attacks.
=
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/world/middleeast/05cnd-saddam.html?hp&ex=1162789200&en=55feeded58d269df&ei=5094&partner=homepage
November 5, 2006
Saddam Hussein Is Sentenced to Death
By KIRK SEMPLE
BAGHDAD, Nov. 5 - An Iraqi special tribunal today convicted Saddam Husseinof crimes against humanity and sentenced him to death by hanging for thebrutal repression of a Shiite town in the 1980s.
As the verdict was read, Mr. Hussein shouted, "Long live the people! Longlive the Arab nation! Down with the spies!" He then chanted "God is great."The chief judge, Raouf Rasheed Abdul Rahman, tried to calm Mr. Hussein down."There's no point," Mr. Rahman said.
The five-judge panel, which heard more than nine months of testimony in thecase, also issued death sentences for two of his seven co-defendants: BarzanIbrahim al-Tikriti, Mr. Hussein's half-brother, who was head of Iraq'sdomestic intelligence agency; and Awad al-Bandar, president of Mr. Hussein'srevolutionary court.
=
The Sacramento Bee
http://www.sacbee.com/110/v-print/story/71403.html
Editorial: Another reason to vote 'No' on Proposition 83
-
Published 12:00 am PST Sunday, November 5, 2006
Voters who worry about protecting children from sexual predators haveanother reason to vote No on Proposition 83. The initiative, dubbed"Jessica's Law" by its backers, bars sexual offenders on parole from livingwithin 2,000 feet of a park or school and requires them to wear globalpositioning devices for life. Supporters claim those provisions will betterprotect the public. Sadly, it will likely have the opposite effect, as adraft analysis of the measure prepared by state corrections officialspredicts.
The Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation is gearing up to implementthe initiative. Analysts who wrote the department's report anticipate that,rather than comply with its onerous restrictions, "many will simply chooseto abscond supervision" and that "this will place the community at greaterrisk." A department spokesman downplayed the draft, saying the statements init "probably should not have been so sweeping."
=
The Sacramento Bee
http://www.sacbee.com/110/v-print/story/71369.html
George F. Will: Election night,doing the math on the sidelines
By George F. Will -
Published 12:00 am PST Sunday, November 5, 2006
As ballpark vendors say, you can't enjoy the game without a score card. Hereis one for Tuesday night.
. The election actually began four weeks ago, with early voting.
Passion drives turnout; anger is a passion; contentment is not. Is thereanger at incumbents generally, or only at Republican incumbents? Two yearsago, 162 incumbents in each party (78 percent of Republicans re-elected and87 percent of Democrats) won with at least 60 percent.
Only 21 incumbents won with 55 percent or less. Will these numbers -- andthe 98.6 re-election rate for incumbents since 1996 -- change dramatically?
. In the 14 presidential elections since 1952, only once (1964) didDemocrats win more than 50 percent of the suburban vote. Last May, a GallupPoll measured President Bush's approval among suburban voters at 29 percent.
=
The Washington Post
Two Tales of War: Read 'Em and Weep
By Colbert I. King
Saturday, November 4, 2006; A23
Maybe it was the memory of the turbulent time I spent in the StateDepartment as the Vietnam War escalated. Perhaps it was the names of HowardUniversity classmates on the wall of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. Or maybeit was just the recollection of the arrogance, prevarication and outrightlies by the government during the Vietnam era that caused a sick feeling inthe pit of my stomach as I read "State of Denial," Bob Woodward's insidelook at the Bush administration and the Iraq debacle.
How in the world could we be reliving a nightmare like Vietnam?
To be sure, that war and Iraq are different in the number of casualties, thegeography and the enemy. But there are ghostly similarities. Writing aboutVietnam in his book "My American Journey," Gen. Colin Powell made itabundantly clear that U.S. policymakers had almost no understanding of whatthey had gotten themselves into. Woodward makes the same point aboutPresident Bush and his advisers, and in excruciating detail. Vietnam was aquagmire; so is Iraq.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/weekinreview/05greenhouse.html?pagewanted=print
November 5, 2006
Kennedy's Choice
The Roberts Court Takes on Abortion
By LINDA GREENHOUSE
WASHINGTON
THE arguments the Supreme Court will hear on Wednesday on theconstitutionality of the federal Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act promise muchmore than a resumption of a familiar debate over a method of terminating apregnancy.
In defining the permissible limits on access to abortion, only six yearsafter declaring a similar restriction unconstitutional in a case fromNebraska, the court must go a long way toward defining its stance towardprecedent, its relationship to Congress, and its view of its own role in theconstitutional system. As it decides the new cases, the still-emergingRoberts court will inevitably be defining itself.
=
The New York Times
http://select.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/opinion/05brooks.html?pagewanted=print
November 5, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist
The Fighting Democrat
By DAVID BROOKS
Once upon a time, the Democrats were the majority party, but then came the1960s and many middle-class whites like Jim Webb drifted away. Webb servedheroically in Vietnam and came back disgusted with the liberal elites whoreviled the military and, as he wrote in 1997, "were trying to destroy thefoundations of American society."
"Jane Fonda can kiss my [behind]," he once told a radio interviewer in thebracing and irrepressible manner that is his trademark. "I wouldn't goacross the street to watch her slit her wrist."
Webb found himself at Georgetown Law School. "Webb came to view the majorityof his fellow students as the most miserable, neurotic and obsessivecollection of individuals he had ever met," Robert Timberg wrote in "TheNightingale's Song."
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/opinion/05hicks.html?pagewanted=print
November 5, 2006
Op-Ed Contributor
Separate but Equal
By ROBERT HICKS
Franklin, Tenn.
HAROLD FORD, the Democratic representative running for senator in Tennessee,has surprised most of us with his formidable campaign against Bob Corker,the former mayor of Chattanooga, for Bill Frist's seat.
Yet, if truth were known, Mr. Ford's electability seems to be based on whathe has in common with Mr. Corker and not where they differ. Ironic, when youthink about how important this election is, not just for Tennessee, but forthe nation as a whole.
This election is so important that the Republican National Committee createda nasty little ad that included an attractive white woman saying to Mr.Ford, "Call me." The ad, we are told, was a parody, making pointed fun ofMr. Ford's once having attended a party sponsored by Playboy magazine. Butwhat it really did was play to the old fears of miscegenation that many ofmy fellow white Tennesseans haven't been able to strip from their gene pool.It was a crummy, low blow, and I respect Mr. Corker for asking the nationalcommittee to pull it when, in other elections, candidates have been willingto let such garbage be broadcast while claiming they have no control overwhat others put out.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/05/opinion/05sun1.html?pagewanted=print
The Difference Two Years Made
On Tuesday, when this page runs the list of people it has endorsed forelection, we will include no Republican Congressional candidates for thefirst time in our memory. Although Times editorials tend to agree withDemocrats on national policy, we have proudly and consistently endorsed along line of moderate Republicans, particularly for the House. Our onlypolitical loyalty is to making the two-party system as vital and responsibleas possible.
That is why things are different this year.
To begin with, the Republican majority that has run the House - and for themost part, the Senate - during President Bush's tenure has done a terriblejob on the basics. Its tax-cutting-above-all-else has wrecked the budget,hobbled the middle class and endangered the long-term economy. It hasrefused to face up to global warming and done pathetically little about thecountry's dependence on foreign oil.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/washington/politics-usa-elections-churches.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print
November 4, 2006
U.S. Churches Sharply Divided on Iraq War
By REUTERS
Filed at 8:33 a.m. ET
DALLAS (Reuters) - America's churches are still sharply divided on the warin Iraq as their flocks prepare to go to the polls, although backing for theconflict has dimmed even among the once solidly supportive evangelicalcommunity.
Public opposition to the war -- polls show a solid majority of more than 60percent of Americans opposed -- is seen as a major reason President GeorgeW. Bush's Republican Party is battling to retain control of the U.S.Congress in Tuesday's elections.
And with far higher church attendance rates in the United States than inother parts of the rich industrialized world church stances on the war, ason other issues, loom large in politics.
=
http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_anthony__061103_the_dawning_of_karl_.htm
November 3, 2006 at 12:10:30
The Dawning of Karl Rove's October Surprise
by Anthony Wade
http://www.opednews.com
November 3, 2006
I was thinking all week what surprise Karl Rove had for America before theelections. Friday afternoon was when I expected it, but then it came to me.I had forgotten all about the true surprise he has waiting for America.
In 2004, on the Friday before the election, Karl Rove put out a "new" fakeOsama bin Laden tape, designed to scare voters to vote for Bush. It wasprecisely released after the Washington Press Corps had gone home for theweekend, so that it would receive unfettered coverage for three straightdays heading into the presidential election. By the time the analystsfigured out that it was clearly designed to help Bush, he was alreadyaccepting concession from John Kerry.
=
Today's commentary:
http://www.zmag.org/sustainers/content/2006-11/03pilger.cfm
ZNet Commentary
The Blair Doctrine: Blood & Money
November 03, 2006
By John Pilger
On 17 October, President Bush signed a bill that legalised torture and kidnapping and effectively repealed the Bill of Rights and habeas corpus. The CIA can now legally abduct people and "render" them to secret prisons in countries where they are likely to be tortured. Evidence extracted under torture is now permissible in "military commissions"; people can be sentenced to death based on testimony beaten out of witnesses. You are now guilty until confirmed guilty. And you are a "terrorist" if you commit what George Orwell, in Nineteen Eighty-Four, called "thoughtcrimes". Bush has revived the prerogatives of the Tudor and Stuart monarchs: the power of unrestricted lawlessness. "America can be proud," said Senator Lindsey Graham, one of the bill's promoters, who stood with other congressmen, clapping as Bush signed away the American constitution and the essence of American democracy.
The historic significance of this was barely acknowledged in Britain, the source of these abandoned ancient rights, no doubt because the same barbarians' law is taking hold here. The great crime of Iraq is a moral tsunami that has left New Labour's vassals floundering and shouting their hopeless inversions of the truth as they await rescue by Washington.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest to
Rays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
FLORIDA DIGEST NOVEMBER 5, 2006
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US AT
rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/state/content/state/epaper/2006/11/05/m1a_flagov_1105.html
rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/state/content/state/epaper/2006/11/05/m1a_flagov_1105.html
The Palm Beach Post
Governor race tightens: Crist still leads confidently, but Davis gains
By Brian E. Crowley
Palm Beach Post Political Editor
Sunday, November 05, 2006
TAMPA - Maybe Jim Davis should just go ahead and declare victory. Name atransition team. Act as if Charlie Crist has no real chance of becomingFlorida's 44th governor Tuesday.That was some of the thinking going on in the Davis campaign last week afterthe Democratic candidate for governor finally began to emerge as a seriousthreat to Crist.
After months of lagging behind the Republican nominee, Davis supporters aresensing a political tailwind. They are buoyed by what they believe were twovery successful television debates and the new, sharper edge of the Daviscampaign.
=
Candidates' policies
November 5, 2006
A look at some of the key policy differences between Charlie Crist and JimDavis:
EDUCATION
Crist -- Keep A-F grading system for public schools; continue using FCATtoreward teachers and schools and decide which students get promotedandgraduate; spend $150 million to give 10 percent pay raises to the top25percent of Florida's teachers; fight for constitutional amendment tobringback private school vouchers.
Davis -- Dump A-F grading system and use variety of indicators todetermineif a school is excellent, achieving or needs improvement; use FCATas adiagnostic tool to see where students need help and let parents seegradedexams; spend $700 million to give an average $3,835 salary boost toallteachers; opposes giving state money to private schools except foreducationof disabled students.
PROPERTY INSURANCE ...
=
The Miami HeraldNovember 5, 2006
CAMPAIGN 2006 | AMENDMENTS
5 proposed amendments likely to pass
Five of six proposed constitutional amendments are likely to pass Tuesday,including one that would make it harder to amend the Constitution.
BY GARY
Voters appear poised to approve five out of six constitutional amendments onTuesday's ballot, a new Miami Herald poll shows. But the survey shows thatsupport has dropped substantially over the past month for a controversialmeasure that would make it harder to change the state Constitution in thefuture.The poll shows that support for Amendment 3 -- which would require allfuture constitutional amendments to pass by a 60 percent margin instead ofthe current simple majority -- has dropped sharply in the past month.
In late September, a Miami Herald poll found 67 percent favor the amendment; 27percent oppose.
=
The Miami Herald
November 5, 2006
Posted on Sun, Nov. 05, 2006
ATTORNEY GENERAL CHARLIE CRIST HOLDS COMFORTABLE LEAD IN GOVERNOR'S RACE
BY MARY ELLEN KLAS AND BETH REINHARD
The GOP seems poised to continue dominating Florida's statewide electedoffices, according to a Miami Herald poll.
In the top-billed race for governor, Republican Charlie Crist leads DemocratJim Davis 48 percent to 38 percent. Republican candidates also lead incampaigns for attorney general, agriculture commissioner and, by a smallmargin, chief financial officer.
But the large number of fence-sitting voters could tilt the contests -- ifthey go to the polls Tuesday feeling hostile toward the GOP establishment inWashington and Tallahassee. Florida Democrats, buoyed by one of theirstrongest statewide tickets in years and nationwide discontent with theRepublican Party, are trying to regain a toehold in Tallahassee.
=
The Miami Herald
November 5, 2006
U.S. CONGRESS, DISTRICT 22
Shaw versus Klein: Costly and critical
The outcome of the race between Clay Shaw and Ron Klein will help determinewhether Republicans or Democrats control the U.S. House of Representatives.
BY ERIKA BOLSTADebolstad@MiamiHerald.com
Over the years, Republican U.S. Rep. Clay Shaw has faced some tight battlesfor reelection, but this year's contest with state Sen. Ron Klein has beenthe closest and most expensive yet.The race has drawn national attention, in part because it's one of a handfulof congressional contests in the United States that could determine whetherthe GOP holds onto the House of Representatives or Democrats take charge.For weeks, it's been too close to call, no matter who does the polling. AHerald poll conducted last week found that Klein leads Shaw 49.2 to 39.6percent, with 6 percent of voters remaining undecided. The poll has a marginof error of plus or minus 5 percentage points.
=
The Miami HeraldNovember 5, 2006
BROWARD COUNTY COMMISSION
Race for Broward's District 4 seat is most heatedAs two commissioners defend their seats, a former state legislator hasoutspent a doctor in a race for an open seat.
BY AMY SHERMAN
A former state legislator has raised far more money than her opponent in therace to fill an open seat on the Broward County Commission, while twoincumbents also have raised six figures in the final stage of the campaign.The race between County Commissioner Jim Scott, a longtime electedRepublican official in Broward, and Democratic activist Ken Keechl, has beenthe hottest race among the three.Scott had raised nearly $400,000 by mid-October while Keechl raised about$180,000 -- about two-thirds from himself.
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The Miami Herald
November 5, 2006
BROWARD COUNTY
Broward ballot includes tax questionsBroward voters will decide on two tax measures when they go to the polls.They'll also indicate an opinion on two nonbinding referendums.
BY ERIKA BOLSTAD
Some hotly debated money matters should grab Broward voters' attention atTuesday's elections.
There will be four final choices when voters get to the end of their ballots.Two questions ask if they want to raise taxes for improved mass transit anda new courthouse.Two others are nonbinding; they're being used to gauge public opinion forfuture government decisions.. Voters are being asked to approve a $450 million bond issue to build a newcourthouse tower and upgrade older parts of the existing courthouse. Theaverage homeowner would pay an estimated $35 a year for the project.
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The Miami HeraldNovember 5, 2006
STATE HOUSE DISTRICT 91
Bogdanoff faces newcomer Chiari in House raceRising hurricane insurance premiums and property taxes are among the mainissues facing the coastal District 91.
BY DARRAN SIMON
State House District 91 candidatesBogdanoff faces newcomer ChiariLast month, state Rep. Ellyn Bogdanoff sat down for a picnic in a SouthFlorida park with about 50 kids from Port Charlotte who supported her recentanti-bullying bill.Bogdanoff's bill, which would require school districts to create and enforceanti-bullying policies, passed the House last legislative session butstalled in the Senate. If relected on Tuesday, Bogdanoff said she plans toreintroduce the bill so parents can feel at ease that their children will besafe from bullies at school.
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The Miami Herald
November 5, 2006
SCHOOL BOARD DISTRICT 6
Rubinstein, Hope go directly to voters in Broward School Board raceIncumbent Marty Rubinstein and challenger Phyllis Hope are facing off forthe Broward School Board District 6 seat.
BY HANNAH
a.. District 6 candidatesIt was a little more than a week before the election for School BoardDistrict 6, and opponents Marty Rubinstein and Phyllis C. Hope had the sameidea.''My name is Hope. Please vote for me,'' Hope said to an early voter at thePlantation courthouse late Monday afternoon.''Sir, you coming out to vote? What city do you live in?'' Rubinstein askeda man Monday at an early voting site in Tamarac.
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The Miami Herald
November 5, 2006
SCHOOL BOARD DISTRICT 1
Three run to fill empty seat on Broward School BoardThe race for the District 1 School Board seat is a three-way contest for anoffice voters already cast their ballots for once this year.
BY NIRVI SHAH
A teacher and two veteran politicians are nearing the end of their briefcampaign to represent Southeast Broward on the School Board.The three candidates for District 1 are spending the last days on thestreets and knocking on doors to secure precious votes and avoid a runoff.The race pits self-made auto repair and towing millionaire and longtimeDania Beach city Commissioner C.K. ''Mac'' McElyea against special educationteacher Terry Snipes, whose own learning disability went undiagnosed as achild, and Eleanor Sobel, a former teacher and longtime state representativewith her own line of skin care products.
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The Miami HeraldNovember 5, 2006
Eight left in battle for seats on Broward benchEight candidates are vying for four new spots on the Broward bench.
BY NIKKI WALLER
The eight candidates running for four new judgeships in Broward Circuit andCounty courts have been a constant presence at polling sites since earlyvoting began.As Tuesday's general election nears, the candidates are courting countyvoters with TV and radio ads and visiting all-important voter havens such asCentury Village.In Circuit Group 57, Pompano Beach Mayor John C. Rayson is running againstMichele Towbin Singer, a veteran assistant public defender in Miami whostepped down from her job to run. In Group 58, Marina Garcia Wood, a Browardmagistrate who resigned to run, is up against former prosecutor Mardi LeveyCohen.
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The Miami HeraldNovember 5, 2006
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/front/15933603.htmPoll shows Shaw trailing Klein in U.S. House race
BY ERIKA BOLSTAD AND LESLEY CLARK
Veteran U.S. Rep. Clay Shaw trails his Democratic challenger by 10 points ina Miami Herald poll that underscores the difficulties Republicans face asthey try to maintain control of the U.S. House of Representatives amidincreasing voter unrest.The poll of 401 likely voters in one of the hottest congressional races inthe country shows that the war in Iraq is a major factor in how people willvote. That's a problem for Shaw, who voted for the war and has labored todistance himself from President Bush.Republicans have sought to keep the congressional races focused locally, butthe survey results suggest that Tuesday's election has ''morphed into areferendum on President Bush and the war on Iraq,'' said pollster JohnZogby, who conducted the survey for The Miami Herald.
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http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/opinion/editorial/sfl-editafbrowardballotnov05,0,2390919.story?coll=sfla-news-editorial
Summary of recommendations
South Florida Sun-Sentinel Editorial Board - State and Broward
November 5, 2006
Summary of recommendations
U.S. SENATE
Bill Nelson - D
U.S. HOUSE
District 22
Clay Shaw - R
GOVERNOR
Charlie Crist - R
ATTORNEY GENERAL
Walter "Skip" Campbell - D
CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER
Adelaide "Alex" Sink - D
COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE & CONSUMER SERVICES
Charles Bronson - R
FLORIDA SENATE
District 32: Jeremy Ring - D
FLORIDA HOUSE
District 91:
Ellyn Bogdanoff - R
District 93:
Perry Thurston - D
District 97:
Susan Goldstein - R
District 99:
Elaine Schwartz - D
COUNTY COMMISSION
District 1: Kristin Jacobs - D
District 3: Stacy Ritter - D
District 4: Jim Scott - R
SCHOOL BOARD
District 1: Eleanor Sobel
District 6: Marty Rubinstein
COUNTY COURT
Group 31: Ellen Feld
Group 32: Brenda Lynn Di Ioia
CIRCUIT COURT
Group 57: John C. Rayson
Group 58: Marina Wood
SUPREME COURT JUSTICES
R. Fred Lewis - Retain
Barbara Joan Pariente - Retain
Peggy A. Quince - Retain
DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL
Bobby W. Gunther - Retain
Fred A. Hazouri - Retain
Larry A. Klein - Retain
Barry J. Stone - Retain
Carole Y. Taylor - Retain
PARKLAND CITY COMMISSION
District 4: Mark Weissman
SOUTHWEST RANCHES TOWN COUNCIL
District 1: Al Avello
WESTON CITY COMMISSION
Seat 4: Murray Chermak
Copyright © 2006, South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Summary of recommendations
South Florida Sun-Sentinel Editorial Board - State and Broward
November 5, 2006
Summary of recommendations
U.S. SENATE
Bill Nelson - D
U.S. HOUSE
District 22
Clay Shaw - R
GOVERNOR
Charlie Crist - R
ATTORNEY GENERAL
Walter "Skip" Campbell - D
CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER
Adelaide "Alex" Sink - D
COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE & CONSUMER SERVICES
Charles Bronson - R
FLORIDA SENATE
District 32: Jeremy Ring - D
FLORIDA HOUSE
District 91:
Ellyn Bogdanoff - R
District 93:
Perry Thurston - D
District 97:
Susan Goldstein - R
District 99:
Elaine Schwartz - D
COUNTY COMMISSION
District 1: Kristin Jacobs - D
District 3: Stacy Ritter - D
District 4: Jim Scott - R
SCHOOL BOARD
District 1: Eleanor Sobel
District 6: Marty Rubinstein
COUNTY COURT
Group 31: Ellen Feld
Group 32: Brenda Lynn Di Ioia
CIRCUIT COURT
Group 57: John C. Rayson
Group 58: Marina Wood
SUPREME COURT JUSTICES
R. Fred Lewis - Retain
Barbara Joan Pariente - Retain
Peggy A. Quince - Retain
DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL
Bobby W. Gunther - Retain
Fred A. Hazouri - Retain
Larry A. Klein - Retain
Barry J. Stone - Retain
Carole Y. Taylor - Retain
PARKLAND CITY COMMISSION
District 4: Mark Weissman
SOUTHWEST RANCHES TOWN COUNCIL
District 1: Al Avello
WESTON CITY COMMISSION
Seat 4: Murray Chermak
Copyright © 2006, South Florida Sun-Sentinel
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http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/opinion/editorial/sfl-editafpalmballotnov05,0,4138520.story?coll=sfla-news-editorial
Summary of recommendations - Palm Beach
South Florida Sun-Sentinel Editorial Board
November 5, 2006
FLORIDA SENATE
District 28: Ken Pruitt - R
FLORIDA HOUSE
District 83:
Carl Domino - R
District 85:
Shelley Vana - D
District 86:
Maria Sachs - D
District 99:
Elaine Schwartz - D
COUNTY COMMISSION
District 2: Jeff Koons - D
District 6:
John E. Carroll - R
TAX COLLECTOR
Pete Carney - R
COUNTY COURT
Group 19: Frank S. Castor
CIRCUIT COURT
Group 13: David E. French
BOYNTON BEACH MAYOR
Jerry Taylor
SUPREME COURT JUSTICES
R. Fred Lewis - Retain
Barbara Joan Pariente - Retain
Peggy A. Quince - Retain
DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL
Bobby W. Gunther - Retain
Fred A. Hazouri - Retain
Larry A. Klein - Retain
Barry J. Stone - Retain
Carole Y. Taylor - Retain
Copyright © 2006, South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Summary of recommendations - Palm Beach
South Florida Sun-Sentinel Editorial Board
November 5, 2006
FLORIDA SENATE
District 28: Ken Pruitt - R
FLORIDA HOUSE
District 83:
Carl Domino - R
District 85:
Shelley Vana - D
District 86:
Maria Sachs - D
District 99:
Elaine Schwartz - D
COUNTY COMMISSION
District 2: Jeff Koons - D
District 6:
John E. Carroll - R
TAX COLLECTOR
Pete Carney - R
COUNTY COURT
Group 19: Frank S. Castor
CIRCUIT COURT
Group 13: David E. French
BOYNTON BEACH MAYOR
Jerry Taylor
SUPREME COURT JUSTICES
R. Fred Lewis - Retain
Barbara Joan Pariente - Retain
Peggy A. Quince - Retain
DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL
Bobby W. Gunther - Retain
Fred A. Hazouri - Retain
Larry A. Klein - Retain
Barry J. Stone - Retain
Carole Y. Taylor - Retain
Copyright © 2006, South Florida Sun-Sentinel
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DISTRICT 22 CONGRESSIONAL ELECTION
Shaw vs. Klein: Who is paying for one of the nation's most expensivecampaigns?
By Brittany Wallman
South Florida Sun-SentinelNovember 5, 2006
FORT LAUDERDALE -- Clay Shaw's top campaign contributor was the WayneHuizenga empire. Ron Klein got his biggest chunk of money from Ansca Homes,a homebuilder.Shaw's top ZIP code for donations was his hometown, Fort Lauderdale. Klein'swas his hometown, Boca Raton.Business givers favor Shaw. Labor unions like Klein.
For voters still evaluating whom to vote for in the congressional District22 race -- incumbent Republican Clay Shaw; state Sen. Ron Klein, theDemocrat; or longtime Libertarian Neil Evangelista, running without a partylabel -- a look at where their money came from may offer more information.
The Broward-Palm congressional district race is fueled by unprecedenteddollars for the two major party candidates, neither of whom has ever raisedthis much money before. With Shaw and Klein each topping $4 million incontributions, and the major political parties and independent groupsspending millions as well, this race could hit the $12 million mark.
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In Broward, number of independents continues to grow
By Anthony ManPolitical Writer
November 5, 2006
Independent voters, tired of politics as usual, are a pivotal bloc thatcould determine the outcome of several close contests on Tuesday. And thereare more independents this year than ever.
Party leaders and political scientists said independents -- a large andgrowing force of often disaffected voters -- could be pivotal in the CharlieCrist-Jim Davis race for governor, the Ron Klein-Clay Shaw congressional contest, and the Susan Goldstein-Martin Kiar race for a Broward seat in thestate House.
Both major parties know they need to court independents. "They arepotentially huge in swinging the races to one side or another," said U.S.Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Weston.Broward Republican Chairman Shane Strum agreed: "Independents play a biggerrole in this election cycle than they ever have before."
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On Sunday evening (November 5) while the people in Britain will besetting off fireworks to celebrate Guy Fawkes - the man who tried toblow up Parliament in the 17th century there will be fireworks of adifferent nature at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts when TheFlamingo Freedom Band, Florida's only Gay and Lesbian concert band, willbe celebrating their 20th anniversary with a show called, "Strike Up theBand."
The concert starts at 7:30pm at the Amaturo Theatre and will featurespecial guests the FortLauderdale Gay Men's Chorus, the Rough Ridersof South Florida, and the South FloridaLambda Chorale. The musicalselections will be from Broadway and Beyond, including West SideStory,Candide, and Les Miserables. Come enjoy popular music from composerslike LeonardBernstein, Aaron Copland, Andrew Lloyd Webber, and GeorgeGershwin. Tickets are $25 and$40 and are available now at
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The Miami Herald
If Davis wins, he can thank Charlie Crist
By BETH REINHARD
Political guru James Carville recently gave a great quote about candidatesstumbling in acampaign's waning days, running on too much caffeine and notenough sleep.''Oftentimes,'' hetold The New York Times, 'the campaigns and candidateswould say, `What do you think Ishould do?' And my answer is one word:less.''Less would have been more for Florida'sfront-running candidate forgovernor, the normally pitch-perfect Republican Charlie Crist,during thisfinal week of the campaign.
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The Washington Post
Fla. Candidate Battles the Anti-GOP TideHouse Hopeful in Heavily Republican District Tries to Rally DisenchantedVoter Base
By Michael Grunwald
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, November 5, 2006; A05
BRADENTON, Fla., Nov. 4 -- Vern Buchanan is the Republican congressionalcandidate in thisheavily Republican district, hoping to succeed a onetimeGOP icon, Rep. Katharine Harris. Theself-made businessman has given hiscampaign $5.5 million, the third-largest cash dump in thehistory of Houseraces. He has campaigned with President Bush, first lady Laura Bush, Gov.JebBush and Vice President Cheney; today's guest was former New York mayorRudolph W.Giuliani.But he's still in trouble.
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STRIKE UP THE BAND:THE FLAMINGO FREEDOM BAND'S 20TH ANNIVERSARY CONCERT WITH SPECIAL GUESTS THEFORT LAUDERDALE GAY MEN'S CHORUS, THE ROUGH RIDERS OF SOUTH FLORIDA, AND THESOUTH FLORIDA LAMBDA CHORALE
The Flamingo Freedom Band, Florida's only Gay and Lesbian concert band, willbe presenting a fall concert entitled Strike Up the Band on Sunday, November5, 2006 at 7:30pm at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts. Thisconcert will celebrate the band's 20th Anniversary and will feature specialguests the Fort Lauderdale Gay Men's Chorus, the Rough Riders of SouthFlorida, and the South Florida Lambda Chorale. The musical selections willbe from Broadway and Beyond, including West Side Story, Candide, and LesMiserables. Come enjoy popular music from composers like Leonard Bernstein,Aaron Copland, Andrew Lloyd Webber, and George Gershwin. Tickets are $25 and$40 and are available at www.browardcenter.org. This One Night Only eventhas been made possible by generous funding through the Community Foundationof Broward County, the Broward County CulturalDivision, Pride SouthFlorida, and the Broward Center Arts Access Program.
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by Steve Rothaus
President Bill Clinton a surprise guest at Task Force Recognition Dinner in South Beach Former President Bill Clinton paid a surprise visit Saturday night at theNational Gay and Lesbian Task Force Recognition Dinner in South Beach. Left, he greets civil rights giant Julian Bond, who received the Task Force's National Leadership Award. Clinton shook lots of hands and then swiftly departed the Loews Miami BeachHotel, where the 10th annual Recognition Dinner took place.Other honorees: Bob Cole (Miami Herald Humanitarian Award) and TWN (Community Service Award).
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest to
Rays.List@Comcast.net ]
Rays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
Saturday, November 04, 2006
GLBT DIGEST - November 4, 2006
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US AT
rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
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http://www.ajc.com/search/content/shared-gen/ap/Latin_America_And_Caribbean/St_Maarten_Tourists_Attacked.html
4 Convicted of Beating Gay Tourists
PHILIPSBURG, St. Maarten - Four French nationals were convicted Thursday ofbeating two gay American tourists in this Dutch Caribbean island and weresentenced to between six months and six years in prison.
One of the victims, Ryan Smith, suffered brain damage and could not speakproperly for six months after he was attacked with a tire iron in April.Smith and the second victim, Richard Jefferson, were employees of CBS Newsin New York at the time of the attack.
Three citizens of the French part of the island - Glen Cockly, MichelineDelaney and Allan Daniel - and a man from the nearby French Caribbean islandof Guadeloupe, Michel Javois, were found guilty of public violence andcausing grievous bodily harm.
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http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-2902.html
Tennis ace joins "gay sheep" protests
03-November-2006
Marc Shoffman
Animal rights campaigners have praised lesbian tennis icon MartinaNavratilova after she criticised experiments taking place on sheep perceivedto be gay.
Navratilova spoke out against Oregon State University (OSU) and OregonHealth & Science University (OHSU) this week after it emerged that theinstitutions are conducting hormone-altering experiments on "gay sheep" tomanipulate their "sexual preferences."
The tennis star has been backed by the PETA (People For The EthicalTreatment Of Animals) after she wrote to the presidents of both universitiesdemanding they stop the experiments and spend the money on a worthy cause.
She wrote, "How can it be that, in the year 2006, a major university wouldhost such homophobic and cruel experiments? ... I respectfully ask that youpull the plug on this appalling and misguided research. Surely you can finda way to redirect the millions of public tax dollars that are being wastedon these experiments to a more fruitful venture-perhaps by funding a gay andlesbian community centre to foster dialogue and acceptance for people of allsexual preferences?"
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The Rocky Mountain News
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_5115625,00.html
Haggard's sex accuser fails polygraph
By David Montero, Rocky Mountain News
November 3, 2006
A former male prostitute who accused Colorado Springs pastor Ted Haggard ofengaging in gay sex over the course of three years failed a polygraph testadministered Friday morning in Denver.
The polygrapher, John Kresnik, said the results "indicated deception" but healso believed the results may have been skewed because the accuser, MikeJones, was suffering from a migraine and didn't get much sleep.
"I'm disappointed with myself," Jones said on Peter Boyles' morning talkshow on KHOW radio after taking the 90-minute polygraph. "I feel like I'vedisappointed a lot of people. I initiated it and I'm willing to accept theconsequences of it."
However, Jones said he "would not back down" from his original accusations.He also said - at the prompting of Kresnik - to take two more lie detectortests after he got some sleep. Jones said he only got two hours of sleep.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Haggard-Sex-Allegations.html?pagewanted=print
November 4, 2006
Evangelical Leader Says He Bought Drugs
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 7:43 a.m. ET
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP) -- The Rev. Ted Haggard said Friday he boughtmethamphetamine and received a massage from a male prostitute. But theinfluential Christian evangelist insisted he threw the drugs away and neverhad sex with the man.
Haggard, who as president of the National Association of Evangelicalswielded influence on Capitol Hill and condemned both gay marriage andhomosexuality, resigned on Thursday after a Denver man named Mike Jonesclaimed that he had many drug-fueled trysts with Haggard.
On Friday, Haggard said that he received a massage from Jones after beingreferred to him by a Denver hotel, and that he bought meth for himself fromthe man.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/arts/AP-People-Neil-Patrick-Harris.html?pagewanted=print
November 4, 2006
Actor Neil Patrick Harris Says He Is Gay
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 3:01 a.m. ET
LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Neil Patrick Harris is gay and wants to quell any rumorsto the contrary. ''(I) am quite proud to say that I am a very content gayman living my life to the fullest,'' Harris tells People magazine's Website.
The 33-year-old actor said he was motivated to disclose his sexualitybecause of recent ''speculation and interest in my private life andrelationships.''
Harris stars on the CBS comedy ''How I Met Your Mother.'' He started on TVas a teen, playing the namesake doctor on the series ''Doogie Howser, M.D.''
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The current issue of The Express Gay News is online
http://expressgaynews.com/
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The current issue of The Independent Gay News is online
http://www.indynews.4t.com/
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/03/AR2006110301617_pf.html
Minister Admits to Buying Drugs and Massage
By Alan Cooperman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, November 4, 2006; A02
The Rev. Ted Haggard, the Colorado minister who resigned Thursday aspresident of the National Association of Evangelicals, admitted yesterdaythat he bought methamphetamine and received a massage from a maleprostitute.
But Haggard told reporters outside his home in Colorado Springs that themassage was arranged by a Denver hotel and was not sexual. He also said hethrew the drugs away. "I never kept it very long, because it's -- it waswrong. I was tempted. I bought it, but I never used it," he said.
The 11-member executive committee of the NAE said late last night that ithad accepted his resignation. Given "the seriousness of Rev. Haggard'smisconduct while in the leadership roles he held, we anticipate an extendedperiod of recovery will be appropriate," the board said.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/03/AR2006110301580_pf.html
Marshall Admits No Doubts About Marriage
Senator's Campaign Against Same-Sex Couples Outrages Opponents
By Chris L. Jenkins
Washington Post Staff Write
Saturday, November 4, 2006; B04
The debate was over, and the stately atrium at the University of VirginiaSchool of Law was nearly empty. But Del. Robert G. Marshall, a PrinceWilliam County Republican who wryly refers to himself as Virginia's "chiefhomophobe," was just warming up to his next showdown over same-sex marriage.
"There is a natural order of things, a natural order where gay marriage isan impossibility," he said, books tucked under his arm and waving a hand foremphasis, like the disheveled college professor he often resembles. "Forexample, a woman's arm is constructed at a certain angle so that she canadequately cradle a baby. This is the way we're created. There are justcertain things that nature intended."
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Contra Costa Times
http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/news/15912811.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Thu, Nov. 02, 2006
Poll shows increased support for banning gay marriage
GEOFF MULVIHILL
Associated Press
MOUNT LAUREL, N.J. - Support for banning gay marriage in New Jerseygrew in the days after the state Supreme Court ruled that gay couples shouldhave the same rights as married heterosexuals, according to a poll releasedThursday.
A little over half the Rutgers-Eagleton poll's 809 respondents favoredchanging the state constitution so that gay marriages would be banned. InJune, a poll showed the opposite, with a little more than half opposing sucha constitutional amendment.
The state Supreme Court last week ruled that New Jersey's Legislaturehad six months to extend to gay couples the same protections thatheterosexual couples get when they are married. But the court said thelawmakers do not have to call it marriage.
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JIM DAVIS SIGNS END AIDS NOW PLEDGE
Congressman Jim Davis - Florida Gubernatorial Candidatesigns END AIDS NOW PLEDGE
Never before has a Gubernatorial Candidate signed a pledge to End AIDS!
Fort Lauderdale, FL - Tonight Congressman Jim Davis demonstrated leadership to the nation and the 125,000+ Floridians living with HIV/AIDS when he signed the END AIDS NOW PLEDGE. For the past several months exhaustive efforts to have been made to have any gubernatorial candidate to provide an official response to Florida having the third-most cases of HIV/AIDS in the nation and South Florida accounting for 3 of the 4 counties having the highest HIV infection rate in the nation per capita.
T0night, Gubernatorial Candidate Jim Davis committed to "work to develop and implement a plan to end AIDS including universal access to education, awareness, prevention, treatment, care and support.
Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz joined Jim Davis in taking a stand to demand leadership and sign the END AIDS NOW PLEDGE! She kept asking me, "Michael, tell me what I can do to help and I will!"
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http://www.speroforum.com/site/print.asp?idarticle=6389
Transcripts of Pastor Ted Haggard soliciting drugs
Gay escort releases recordings of phone messages allegedlycontaining the voice of Pastor Ted Haggard soliciting methamphetamines
Friday, November 03, 2006
Spero News
Mike Jones, a 49-year-old male escort who lives in Denver accused Rev.Ted Haggard, Evangelical Senior Pastor of the 14,000-member New Life Churchin Colorado Springs, of engaging in a three-year homosexual relationshipwith him that he said included methamphetamines use. Jones said he has theproof in recordings of telephone messages Rev. Haggard left for him.
Haggard confessed to his church's board of overseers about some of theaccusations although the board has not revealed details of the confession.
Jones provided two voice messages to the local news channel, 9News,claiming they include the voice of Haggard calling him. A voice expert told9NEWS that the messages left for the male escort matched the voice of PastorHaggard. Jones claims Art is really Haggard and is referring tomethamphetamines in the messages.
August 4, 2006 2:18 pm
"Hi Mike, this is Art. Hey, I was just calling to see if we couldget any more. Either $100 or $200 supply. And I could pick it up reallyanytime I could get it tomorrow or we could wait till next week sometime andso I also wanted to get your address. I could send you some money forinventory but that's probably not working, so if you have it then go aheadand get what you can and I may buzz up there later today, but I doubt yourschedule would allow that unless you have some in the house. Okay, I'llcheck in with you later. Thanks a lot, bye."
more....
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Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
The Christian Right's scare tactics and the GOP's retreat into homophobia
By Mel Seesholtz, Ph.D.
Online Journal Contributing Writer
Nov 3, 2006
Online Journal [Blog]
http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/printer_1391.shtml
Hitler's National Socialist German Workers Party used the Bible and theirperversion of Christianity to promote bigotry, discrimination and hatred ofJews, gypsies, the physically and mentally impaired and, of course,homosexuals. The Klu Klux Klan still uses the Bible and their perversion ofChristianity to promote bigotry, discrimination and hatred of Blacks, Jewsand, of course, homosexuals. The American Family Association constantly usesthe Bible and their perversion of Christianity to promote bigotry,discrimination and hatred, but they have a more focused target:homosexuals and any group or company that supports the social recognition orlegal equality of gay and lesbian Americans, such as the dastardly"pro-homosexual" Wal-Mart chain.
Don Wildmon's American Family Association -- which is dedicated todemeaning, denigrating and, if possible, destroying gay and lesbianAmericans and their families -- "has called on Christian consumers to spendtheir dollars elsewhere as a sign of their displeasure with Wal- Mart'spro-homosexual leanings, says the nation's largest retailer is not justworking with the homosexual agenda of the NGLCC [National Gay and LesbianChamber of Commerce], it is promoting it.
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Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
The GOP's dwindling anti-gay parade
Polls show Americans turning their backs on the divisive politics ofhomosexuality. Will hard-liners in the heartland, like Colorado's MarilynMusgrave, be forced to follow?
By Michael Scherer
http://salon.com/news/feature/2006/11/03/colorado/
Salon.com
Nov. 3, 2006 | LOVELAND, Colo. -- In this season of porno-themed politicalads and anti-gay marriage amendments, Colorado Rep. Marilyn Musgrave is,surprisingly, tacking in a different direction. She no longer wants to talkin public about the "radical homosexual agenda"and its malicious impact on the American family. "I am running on a platformof security. Economic security. Border security. National security," thecorn-husk blond Republican announced at the start of a candidate debate lastweek in Windsor.
This is a dramatic departure from the Musgrave of old, the Pentecostalmother of four who came to politics in 1990 as a school committee memberdetermined to stamp out sex education. As a state legislator in Colorado,she campaigned constantly against gay marriage and attempted to denybenefits to the same-sex partners of state employees. In Congress, she hastwice served as the chief sponsor of a constitutional amendment to ban gaymarriage. "As we face the issues we're facing today, I don't think there isanything more important than the marriage issue," she announced, just sixweeks ago, at a Washington conference for values voters. "If we have gaymarriage, our religious liberties are gone."
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Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
Parliamentary committee in South Africa delays decision on civil unions
The Associated Press
International Herald Tribune
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2006/11/03/africa/AF_GEN_South_Africa_Gay_Marriage.php
Friday, November 3, 2006
A key parliamentary committee on Friday delayed a decision on proposedlegislation to enshrine same-sex partnerships in the law to give more timefor discussion the measure.
The Home Affairs Portfolio Committee said it now planned to vote on thelegislation Tuesday or Wednesday.
The Civil Unions Bill was introduced to comply with a Constitutional Courtruling that the government must accord homosexual couples the same rightsand reponsibilities as heterosexual couples. The government has until Dec. 1to comply.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
AZ: McCain Makes TV Ads Against SSM
McCain gets heat on homefront as he heads to California
The Business Journal of Phoenix http://phoenix.bizjournals.com/
phoenix/stories/2006/10/30/daily42.html
As the election enters the homestretch, Sen. John McCain is helpingCalifornia Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, while facing criticism forsupporting a gay marriage/domestic partners benefits proposition onthe homefront.
The Arizona Senator appears in television advertisements favoringProposition 107, a measure than would ban same-sex marriages andprohibits public employers from offering domestic partnershipbenefits and legal status to all unmarried couples.
Prop. 107 also is supported by social conservatives and the CatholicChurch, and opposed by most Democrats, labor unions and gay rightsadvocates who have focused on its domestic partner benefitsprohibitions.
=
http://www.washblade.com/2006/11-3/news/localnews/decision.cfm
N.J. marriage ruling could impact Md. case
Appeals court to review decision in December
By JOSHUA LYNSEN
Nov. 03, 2006
A New Jersey court decision mandating equal marriage rights for gay couplescould influence the outcome of a similar case pending in Maryland, accordingto local observers.
Although the Maryland Court of Appeals is not bound by the New JerseySupreme Court's ruling of Oct. 25, legal observers said the decision couldimpact the Maryland case.
"I think it will have more of an effect psychologically," said Barbara Babb,director of the Center for Families, Children & the Courts at the Universityof Baltimore.
The Maryland Court of Appeals is scheduled to review on Dec. 4 a lower court'sruling that a 1973 state law limiting marriage to heterosexuals isunconstitutional.
* Send your comments to Rays.List@Comcast.net
#####
rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
http://www.ajc.com/search/content/shared-gen/ap/Latin_America_And_Caribbean/St_Maarten_Tourists_Attacked.html
4 Convicted of Beating Gay Tourists
PHILIPSBURG, St. Maarten - Four French nationals were convicted Thursday ofbeating two gay American tourists in this Dutch Caribbean island and weresentenced to between six months and six years in prison.
One of the victims, Ryan Smith, suffered brain damage and could not speakproperly for six months after he was attacked with a tire iron in April.Smith and the second victim, Richard Jefferson, were employees of CBS Newsin New York at the time of the attack.
Three citizens of the French part of the island - Glen Cockly, MichelineDelaney and Allan Daniel - and a man from the nearby French Caribbean islandof Guadeloupe, Michel Javois, were found guilty of public violence andcausing grievous bodily harm.
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http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-2902.html
Tennis ace joins "gay sheep" protests
03-November-2006
Marc Shoffman
Animal rights campaigners have praised lesbian tennis icon MartinaNavratilova after she criticised experiments taking place on sheep perceivedto be gay.
Navratilova spoke out against Oregon State University (OSU) and OregonHealth & Science University (OHSU) this week after it emerged that theinstitutions are conducting hormone-altering experiments on "gay sheep" tomanipulate their "sexual preferences."
The tennis star has been backed by the PETA (People For The EthicalTreatment Of Animals) after she wrote to the presidents of both universitiesdemanding they stop the experiments and spend the money on a worthy cause.
She wrote, "How can it be that, in the year 2006, a major university wouldhost such homophobic and cruel experiments? ... I respectfully ask that youpull the plug on this appalling and misguided research. Surely you can finda way to redirect the millions of public tax dollars that are being wastedon these experiments to a more fruitful venture-perhaps by funding a gay andlesbian community centre to foster dialogue and acceptance for people of allsexual preferences?"
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The Rocky Mountain News
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_5115625,00.html
Haggard's sex accuser fails polygraph
By David Montero, Rocky Mountain News
November 3, 2006
A former male prostitute who accused Colorado Springs pastor Ted Haggard ofengaging in gay sex over the course of three years failed a polygraph testadministered Friday morning in Denver.
The polygrapher, John Kresnik, said the results "indicated deception" but healso believed the results may have been skewed because the accuser, MikeJones, was suffering from a migraine and didn't get much sleep.
"I'm disappointed with myself," Jones said on Peter Boyles' morning talkshow on KHOW radio after taking the 90-minute polygraph. "I feel like I'vedisappointed a lot of people. I initiated it and I'm willing to accept theconsequences of it."
However, Jones said he "would not back down" from his original accusations.He also said - at the prompting of Kresnik - to take two more lie detectortests after he got some sleep. Jones said he only got two hours of sleep.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Haggard-Sex-Allegations.html?pagewanted=print
November 4, 2006
Evangelical Leader Says He Bought Drugs
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 7:43 a.m. ET
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP) -- The Rev. Ted Haggard said Friday he boughtmethamphetamine and received a massage from a male prostitute. But theinfluential Christian evangelist insisted he threw the drugs away and neverhad sex with the man.
Haggard, who as president of the National Association of Evangelicalswielded influence on Capitol Hill and condemned both gay marriage andhomosexuality, resigned on Thursday after a Denver man named Mike Jonesclaimed that he had many drug-fueled trysts with Haggard.
On Friday, Haggard said that he received a massage from Jones after beingreferred to him by a Denver hotel, and that he bought meth for himself fromthe man.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/arts/AP-People-Neil-Patrick-Harris.html?pagewanted=print
November 4, 2006
Actor Neil Patrick Harris Says He Is Gay
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 3:01 a.m. ET
LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Neil Patrick Harris is gay and wants to quell any rumorsto the contrary. ''(I) am quite proud to say that I am a very content gayman living my life to the fullest,'' Harris tells People magazine's Website.
The 33-year-old actor said he was motivated to disclose his sexualitybecause of recent ''speculation and interest in my private life andrelationships.''
Harris stars on the CBS comedy ''How I Met Your Mother.'' He started on TVas a teen, playing the namesake doctor on the series ''Doogie Howser, M.D.''
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The current issue of The Express Gay News is online
http://expressgaynews.com/
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The current issue of The Independent Gay News is online
http://www.indynews.4t.com/
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/03/AR2006110301617_pf.html
Minister Admits to Buying Drugs and Massage
By Alan Cooperman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, November 4, 2006; A02
The Rev. Ted Haggard, the Colorado minister who resigned Thursday aspresident of the National Association of Evangelicals, admitted yesterdaythat he bought methamphetamine and received a massage from a maleprostitute.
But Haggard told reporters outside his home in Colorado Springs that themassage was arranged by a Denver hotel and was not sexual. He also said hethrew the drugs away. "I never kept it very long, because it's -- it waswrong. I was tempted. I bought it, but I never used it," he said.
The 11-member executive committee of the NAE said late last night that ithad accepted his resignation. Given "the seriousness of Rev. Haggard'smisconduct while in the leadership roles he held, we anticipate an extendedperiod of recovery will be appropriate," the board said.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/03/AR2006110301580_pf.html
Marshall Admits No Doubts About Marriage
Senator's Campaign Against Same-Sex Couples Outrages Opponents
By Chris L. Jenkins
Washington Post Staff Write
Saturday, November 4, 2006; B04
The debate was over, and the stately atrium at the University of VirginiaSchool of Law was nearly empty. But Del. Robert G. Marshall, a PrinceWilliam County Republican who wryly refers to himself as Virginia's "chiefhomophobe," was just warming up to his next showdown over same-sex marriage.
"There is a natural order of things, a natural order where gay marriage isan impossibility," he said, books tucked under his arm and waving a hand foremphasis, like the disheveled college professor he often resembles. "Forexample, a woman's arm is constructed at a certain angle so that she canadequately cradle a baby. This is the way we're created. There are justcertain things that nature intended."
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Contra Costa Times
http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/news/15912811.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Thu, Nov. 02, 2006
Poll shows increased support for banning gay marriage
GEOFF MULVIHILL
Associated Press
MOUNT LAUREL, N.J. - Support for banning gay marriage in New Jerseygrew in the days after the state Supreme Court ruled that gay couples shouldhave the same rights as married heterosexuals, according to a poll releasedThursday.
A little over half the Rutgers-Eagleton poll's 809 respondents favoredchanging the state constitution so that gay marriages would be banned. InJune, a poll showed the opposite, with a little more than half opposing sucha constitutional amendment.
The state Supreme Court last week ruled that New Jersey's Legislaturehad six months to extend to gay couples the same protections thatheterosexual couples get when they are married. But the court said thelawmakers do not have to call it marriage.
=
JIM DAVIS SIGNS END AIDS NOW PLEDGE
Congressman Jim Davis - Florida Gubernatorial Candidatesigns END AIDS NOW PLEDGE
Never before has a Gubernatorial Candidate signed a pledge to End AIDS!
Fort Lauderdale, FL - Tonight Congressman Jim Davis demonstrated leadership to the nation and the 125,000+ Floridians living with HIV/AIDS when he signed the END AIDS NOW PLEDGE. For the past several months exhaustive efforts to have been made to have any gubernatorial candidate to provide an official response to Florida having the third-most cases of HIV/AIDS in the nation and South Florida accounting for 3 of the 4 counties having the highest HIV infection rate in the nation per capita.
T0night, Gubernatorial Candidate Jim Davis committed to "work to develop and implement a plan to end AIDS including universal access to education, awareness, prevention, treatment, care and support.
Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz joined Jim Davis in taking a stand to demand leadership and sign the END AIDS NOW PLEDGE! She kept asking me, "Michael, tell me what I can do to help and I will!"
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http://www.speroforum.com/site/print.asp?idarticle=6389
Transcripts of Pastor Ted Haggard soliciting drugs
Gay escort releases recordings of phone messages allegedlycontaining the voice of Pastor Ted Haggard soliciting methamphetamines
Friday, November 03, 2006
Spero News
Mike Jones, a 49-year-old male escort who lives in Denver accused Rev.Ted Haggard, Evangelical Senior Pastor of the 14,000-member New Life Churchin Colorado Springs, of engaging in a three-year homosexual relationshipwith him that he said included methamphetamines use. Jones said he has theproof in recordings of telephone messages Rev. Haggard left for him.
Haggard confessed to his church's board of overseers about some of theaccusations although the board has not revealed details of the confession.
Jones provided two voice messages to the local news channel, 9News,claiming they include the voice of Haggard calling him. A voice expert told9NEWS that the messages left for the male escort matched the voice of PastorHaggard. Jones claims Art is really Haggard and is referring tomethamphetamines in the messages.
August 4, 2006 2:18 pm
"Hi Mike, this is Art. Hey, I was just calling to see if we couldget any more. Either $100 or $200 supply. And I could pick it up reallyanytime I could get it tomorrow or we could wait till next week sometime andso I also wanted to get your address. I could send you some money forinventory but that's probably not working, so if you have it then go aheadand get what you can and I may buzz up there later today, but I doubt yourschedule would allow that unless you have some in the house. Okay, I'llcheck in with you later. Thanks a lot, bye."
more....
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
The Christian Right's scare tactics and the GOP's retreat into homophobia
By Mel Seesholtz, Ph.D.
Online Journal Contributing Writer
Nov 3, 2006
Online Journal [Blog]
http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/printer_1391.shtml
Hitler's National Socialist German Workers Party used the Bible and theirperversion of Christianity to promote bigotry, discrimination and hatred ofJews, gypsies, the physically and mentally impaired and, of course,homosexuals. The Klu Klux Klan still uses the Bible and their perversion ofChristianity to promote bigotry, discrimination and hatred of Blacks, Jewsand, of course, homosexuals. The American Family Association constantly usesthe Bible and their perversion of Christianity to promote bigotry,discrimination and hatred, but they have a more focused target:homosexuals and any group or company that supports the social recognition orlegal equality of gay and lesbian Americans, such as the dastardly"pro-homosexual" Wal-Mart chain.
Don Wildmon's American Family Association -- which is dedicated todemeaning, denigrating and, if possible, destroying gay and lesbianAmericans and their families -- "has called on Christian consumers to spendtheir dollars elsewhere as a sign of their displeasure with Wal- Mart'spro-homosexual leanings, says the nation's largest retailer is not justworking with the homosexual agenda of the NGLCC [National Gay and LesbianChamber of Commerce], it is promoting it.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
The GOP's dwindling anti-gay parade
Polls show Americans turning their backs on the divisive politics ofhomosexuality. Will hard-liners in the heartland, like Colorado's MarilynMusgrave, be forced to follow?
By Michael Scherer
http://salon.com/news/feature/2006/11/03/colorado/
Salon.com
Nov. 3, 2006 | LOVELAND, Colo. -- In this season of porno-themed politicalads and anti-gay marriage amendments, Colorado Rep. Marilyn Musgrave is,surprisingly, tacking in a different direction. She no longer wants to talkin public about the "radical homosexual agenda"and its malicious impact on the American family. "I am running on a platformof security. Economic security. Border security. National security," thecorn-husk blond Republican announced at the start of a candidate debate lastweek in Windsor.
This is a dramatic departure from the Musgrave of old, the Pentecostalmother of four who came to politics in 1990 as a school committee memberdetermined to stamp out sex education. As a state legislator in Colorado,she campaigned constantly against gay marriage and attempted to denybenefits to the same-sex partners of state employees. In Congress, she hastwice served as the chief sponsor of a constitutional amendment to ban gaymarriage. "As we face the issues we're facing today, I don't think there isanything more important than the marriage issue," she announced, just sixweeks ago, at a Washington conference for values voters. "If we have gaymarriage, our religious liberties are gone."
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
Parliamentary committee in South Africa delays decision on civil unions
The Associated Press
International Herald Tribune
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2006/11/03/africa/AF_GEN_South_Africa_Gay_Marriage.php
Friday, November 3, 2006
A key parliamentary committee on Friday delayed a decision on proposedlegislation to enshrine same-sex partnerships in the law to give more timefor discussion the measure.
The Home Affairs Portfolio Committee said it now planned to vote on thelegislation Tuesday or Wednesday.
The Civil Unions Bill was introduced to comply with a Constitutional Courtruling that the government must accord homosexual couples the same rightsand reponsibilities as heterosexual couples. The government has until Dec. 1to comply.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
AZ: McCain Makes TV Ads Against SSM
McCain gets heat on homefront as he heads to California
The Business Journal of Phoenix http://phoenix.bizjournals.com/
phoenix/stories/2006/10/30/daily42.html
As the election enters the homestretch, Sen. John McCain is helpingCalifornia Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, while facing criticism forsupporting a gay marriage/domestic partners benefits proposition onthe homefront.
The Arizona Senator appears in television advertisements favoringProposition 107, a measure than would ban same-sex marriages andprohibits public employers from offering domestic partnershipbenefits and legal status to all unmarried couples.
Prop. 107 also is supported by social conservatives and the CatholicChurch, and opposed by most Democrats, labor unions and gay rightsadvocates who have focused on its domestic partner benefitsprohibitions.
=
http://www.washblade.com/2006/11-3/news/localnews/decision.cfm
N.J. marriage ruling could impact Md. case
Appeals court to review decision in December
By JOSHUA LYNSEN
Nov. 03, 2006
A New Jersey court decision mandating equal marriage rights for gay couplescould influence the outcome of a similar case pending in Maryland, accordingto local observers.
Although the Maryland Court of Appeals is not bound by the New JerseySupreme Court's ruling of Oct. 25, legal observers said the decision couldimpact the Maryland case.
"I think it will have more of an effect psychologically," said Barbara Babb,director of the Center for Families, Children & the Courts at the Universityof Baltimore.
The Maryland Court of Appeals is scheduled to review on Dec. 4 a lower court'sruling that a 1973 state law limiting marriage to heterosexuals isunconstitutional.
* Send your comments to Rays.List@Comcast.net
#####
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